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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23551261">Tiger Squadron: The Dominion War</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/BaelPenrose/pseuds/BaelPenrose'>BaelPenrose</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Tiger Squadron [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Military Science Fiction - Fandom, Original Work, Original science fiction - Fandom, Science Fiction - Fandom</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Cuddle, Earth is Space Australia, HFY, Humans are space orcs, Multi, No Smut, Slavery, Space Otters - Freeform, sci fi action, yeah there's some dark stuff but also Space. Otters.</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 07:27:13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>30,102</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23551261</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/BaelPenrose/pseuds/BaelPenrose</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Humanity's first foray into space and the first major splash with the galactic community.</p><p>Like the entire Tiger Squadron Series, this is originally posted to Tumblr</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Tiger Squadron [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1695037</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>72</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Crash Landing</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>When humanity finally, finally, discovered the gravatic manipulation to allow faster than light travel, as one, we looked to the stars. The Terran Republic began reaching for the outer reaches of the galaxy, in search of new worlds for its strange people to call home, as they’d managed on their own world with deserts, jungles, plains, coasts, tundra, mountains, everything.<br/><br/>But we learned, to the apprehension of some and the joy of others that we were not alone. Our first contact, as many others, were the Ivari, a birdlike race of nomads who were all too happy to trade with us, who had come to explore and catalog many of the galaxy’s greatest anomalies and its most breathtaking sights. We also came to know and work with the proud Dembra, a race of 4-armed builders, dreamers, engineers, of honor, discipline, craftsmanship. And the Epomi, the strange, centaur-like beings, no larger than a small pony, who had figured out solar powered flight craft before they figured out computers or batteries. We quickly came to join the alliance of several different star-faring nations between them, as partners in exploration. Many of them were shocked by our climate tolerances, and several worlds were recommended to us.<br/>Callie and I were just children when all of this happened, of course. Excitable little twerps who wanted to see the stars when we grew up. We got the opportunity sooner than we thought. Our families were brought on board the first full colony outbound flight.<br/><br/>The Ivari and Dembra who agreed to look at the TRS Horizons were impressed by what they referred to as our race’s stubborn insanity. We later met with one of them and he maintains that he’s amazed any of us survived at all. - Jake Andala.<br/>******<br/>The human ship was a catastrophe of engineering. Erratic power fluctuation, many sub-standard engine structures, over-stocked cargo, inadequate impact shielding…how any of them made it is a mystery for the ages. When we begged them, repeatedly, to allow us to look at it, I was told that the internal gravity systems I wanted to create would damage the skeletal structures of humans, which I have learned since was a fair concern, since as it turned out the skeletal structure of our race has, after thousands of years as nomads wandering the stars, evolved to lower gravities than denser human bone structures are able to function with, and since at that point the humans had not yet adapted exosuits for long-term wear it made sense for them to reject our aid in that matter at that point.<br/><br/>We then asked if they would allow the Dembra to re-work it, since that was a race who understood the humans needs as they had adapted to similar gravities, but the humans refused that as well, that the modifications the Dembra wanted to make would screw with the areas that humans insisted their young and even their adults would need for interaction. The notion of sane, safe transport piloted by AI was rejected outright, with some reference to not wanting to deal with something called “Hal” which the humans were insistent was too complicated to explain. The Epomi understood human concerns about the area restrictions but they were content to stick to relatively slow travel as a species and humans…well, we’ve learned since that they like going fast.<br/><br/>When organic pilot error doomed the ship in frontier space, in one of several lightly inhabited systems of the area, we wanted to cry for the lives lost, but secretly, and to our shame, we also privately sighed with relief that humanity would learn caution from this.<br/>It didn’t quite work out that way. – Ivari Flight Engineer, who asked to remain anonymous.<br/>******<br/>We’d heard reports from the Ivari of a new race joining the Federation, however we hadn’t really given it much thought. We were an independent people of the Federation and we intended to keep it that way. We heard stories that the humans were stubborn, insane, and bonded to anything. When we saw evidence of a form of spacecraft we were unfamiliar with, we immediately began scouting the area, until we found evidence of two strange beings, primates, stripping off coverings and bathing, however they looked at each other, their pigments changing slightly, before turning away. This seemed strange, to us at least it was normative for our people to bathe as a communal ritual. This did not seem to apply when the two of them were covered again, they went in search of food. They discovered berries that we were almost tempted to warn them of, but unsure if these were some new form of pirate, we decided against it. One of them popped the berries into its mouth and bared his teeth in what we thought was a threat to the other one, which proceeded to grab a few berries for itself and eat them. They seemed totally untroubled by the seizures we would have experienced, but I saw them wince away from foods we could have eaten without difficulty.<br/><br/>At one point we were given the opportunity to see their reaction to threat against pack mates. A ramor beast had been sighted and a whole group of the warrior caste were out to deal with the threat, when we heard a shout of something, sounded like language, but not one we knew. “JAKE, BE CAREFUL!” A strange noise followed, followed by the guttural roar of the ramor, followed by a scream of pain and when we arrived, we saw one of the two aliens we’d seen earlier wounded, and the other ramming a piece of metal into the ramor’s eye clusters to draw it away from the wounded one, twisting the knife as it did so. The ramor’s vicious, barbed tentacles seized the second alien, the beast shrieking in rage, and the first being stood back up, with a knife of its own and started viciously hacking at the offending limbs, screaming “LET GO OF HER YOU FREAK!” before being swatted back against a tree, the other regaining its breath and stabbing the ramor in the throat, ignoring the bleeding wounds across her chest. We pounced, our shock at two under-armed beings fighting a Ramor finally wearing off, and began grabbing the two the minute the beast had been mown down. A young warrior was told to go get the leading expert on galactic races to communicate with these two. The two of them looked wary, huddling close together and clutching their knives, still ready for a fight. The venom of the Ramor would have taken even the strongest Nathian out but it was nothing to these two, at most they were irritated, but then the one with longer hair squeaked, “OHMYGOD THEY’RE OTTERS THEY’RE ADORABLE!” and began talking in Ivari, the language of the federation builders. “I’m Callie, this is Jake, we’re humans, what are you guys? <br/>We crash landed from a colony ship, we’ve never seen anything like you guys before.” The other one, Jake, bared his teeth. “Thanks for helping us with that…thing. You saved our lives.” I doubted it, if they had stood for a few more minutes the wounds they inflicted would have bled the Ramor to death without us, but seeing what they’d done to a monster we hunted with railguns using nothing but knives, I had no desire to disabuse them of any notion that would make them more friendly.<br/><br/>“So…that thing wasn’t venomous, right?” I told them that it wasn’t, not to our knowledge, to which the humans responded with obvious relief. “So…can you guys help us out? Our shuttle is out of power and our ship exploded in orbit. Have there been any reports of other beings like us? Our whole families were aboard.” I had to tell them no, worried that they would become hostile, but instead they merely starting leaking water from their eyes and making strange noises, like a pup that can’t find its way home. And when they started talking in Galick again, they said, “Well, can we stay with you? Maybe…for a little while? We’ll try to help with whatever we can but if our parents are gone we need somewhere to stay. There should be Ivari or other human ships that come by eventually and take us home.”<br/><br/>I said, “yes,” very quietly, a bit nervously, feeling worried about these strange creatures. Warrior caste or no, I have pups of my own and I would hope if something happened to me someone would take them in if they needed it, and when the more wounded one wrapped its arms around me, I almost panicked. “Thank you.” Once I noticed the mechanical similarities between this gesture and a few of our signals of familial bond, I realized they were showing affection.<br/>*****<br/>Given a solar cycle of this planet, we watched the young humans Jake and Callie bond with our own pups. I saw them play with ours, at one point bringing Namna home when she was hurt playing, with them. I saw them put themselves between our pups and another Ramor, and I saw them delight in the things other pups do.<br/>Yet these had survived a crash that should have killed them. And knife-fought ramors. And won. Humans were strange, but having them around made our people realize that perhaps joining the federation would be a good idea. Seeing how far humans went for their friends certainly made the prospect more attractive. Our people’s name for itself means “Family” and both Jake and Callie certainly fit by the time a ship of the Terran Republic came to recover them. We sent them back with a message that we would like to join the Federation properly, and Jake and Callie swore to assist us with the process. We heard from them again, years later, in much more dire straits. – Written journal of Malida of Tildas II, Lalia clan of Nathia.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Humanity's friends</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>We of the Ivari Union had built the Federation. We’d seen the magnificent megastructures built by the Dembra Union, the incredible, vast, continent-spanning solar powered farms of the Epomi Collective, the tight-knit, loving and fiercely independent Nathian Tribes. We’d mapped the cosmos, seen millions of worlds, tens of thousands with life. Most of the species were primitive, no more than a few dozen we’d seen were sapient, and most were far from space flight.<br/><br/>We’d never seen anything like the mad tenacity of the Human race. Native to a world they called Earth or Terra, they’d grown up on a class-2 death world (previously there were only two classes of death world: Those suitable only for the military or survivalist sects of other species, and those nothing could live on. Those only humans could live on are now class 2, and class 3 is for environments not even humans can survive), and undergone a truly bizarre evolution. Only the toughest, most adaptable creatures could survive their world, and they had proven themselves adapted well to tundra, desert, tropics. They had become predators by chasing things down until their prey became too tired to run.<br/><br/>Humans had never met a challenge they didn’t try. Sometimes they died, sometimes they didn’t, and when they did they sent more to clear the obstacle by all the greater a margin in the second attempt as though daring the universe to defy them again.<br/><br/>After their catastrophic failure with the Horizons, they had simply rebuilt a similar system and tried it again. The Nathians had finally decided to join the federation properly after the stay of two young humans, proving that there wasn’t much limit to the human ability to pack bond, and establishing that the Nathians probably weren’t very different on that front.<br/><br/>So when the Human chancellor met with the Nathian Matriarch, the Dembra Union Chief, the Epomi Minister, and our own leadership, to discuss what the Federation’s next moves should be in the galaxy, in light of troubling reports they’d heard of raiders in Nathian space, who came in ships of strange designs and which they’d had several brief skirmishes with, usually coming off slightly better.<br/><br/>Our very own Archon had to explain to them, fighting panic at the images of the skirmishes the human scouts had participated in, recognizing the ships, that there were highly evolved species that were not a part of the Federation, and we had to explain the Vulpexi Dominion. We told them that the Vulpexi were a race that had incredible technological prowess and used it to maintain hegemony over a wide range of the galaxy. It was known for granting advanced technology to more primitive species in exchange for their loyalty. Many of their vassal species worshipped them as gods, and they used one, a powerful reptilian race called the Tyrsians, as ground troops since the Vulpexi themselves weren’t built for the shock of ground combat.<br/><br/>The humans were curious about meeting them in the interest of negotiating a peace since they were new to the galaxy and didn’t want to be fighting a war. However, we weren’t sure if we were comfortable with the idea, given what we knew of Vulpexi custom and human madness, especially since the Vulpexi Grand Armada alone outnumbered the Federation’s navy and with the exception of the Dembra ships, which were heavier than anything else, it outgunned all of them, too.<br/><br/>The Ivari speaker took point in the attempt. “With respect, human, you have a bit of a reputation for unpredictability. And the Vulpexi Dominion. The Federation doesn’t want a war with them. They have more ships and ground troops than we do.” The human President smiled, and the Epomi Minister shrank back from the sight of this unabashed predator. “We don’t want a war, we’d actually like to talk them down since we mistook them for pirates and they probably mistook us for the same thing. Probably just a misunderstanding that can be smoothed over, and we’d like to try.”<br/><br/>It was then that the Nathian Matriarch spoke. “You don’t understand, human. We joined for two reasons. Those two children of yours – and ours, now - who amazed one of the Families enough to want to ally with your people were one reason. The other was for protection against the Vulpexi. Our outlying colonies are frequently raided by Vulpexi slavers and while we often fight back, most of the time our warriors only buy their families enough time to flee.”<br/><br/>The human ambassador blinked, and stopped smiling, suddenly frowning. “Is that so?” The Dembra Union Chief rumbled in the affirmative. The Dembra were among the few Federation races with a martial tradition that led to them standing against the Dominion forces in combat, and as a result their fleet was always a welcome sight around the Nathians, who were happy to pay a share of resources to the Federation in exchange for occasional assistance. The human chancellor snarled, “To me it would seem that we actually not only already have a war with the Vulpexi, but we should probably seize the casus belli they’ve already provided. I don’t know how you space-faring races do things, but on Earth, when someone comes into your house and kills or kidnaps your people, you don’t just chase them off, you hunt them down, kill them, save your people and burn their house to the ground. If they’re enslaving people of ours, they need to be forced to stop.”<br/><br/>The Epomi Speaker began gradually edging away from the human, and for the first time we realized the kind of beings we Ivari had helped bring to the stars. A race mad enough to risk anything, to colonize anywhere.<br/><br/>A race mad enough to seek aggressive war with the Vulpexi Dominion solely because they had attacked its allies. Violence on an interstellar scale in defiance of the greatest military power in the stars in retribution against it for kidnapping members of a race that had protected human young. Human bonding…and tenacity…knew no bounds. As we would hear from their pilots, their soldiers, their crew, their leaders, even their civilians, “Unless you want to be a victim of natural selection, do not fuck with humanity’s friends.”<br/>- Former Ivari Archon, Yltioca.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. First Battle</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Now that they were finally home, Jake and Callie found themselves the center of more attention than either of them ever wanted. People wanted to ask how they’d won over the Nathians, how they were adapting to being back, what they were planning on doing… None of them seemed to understand that in the seven years they’d spent among Nathians, they’d been adopted. Become part of the clan. Become Nathian.<br/>En route home, they’d heard of the Vulpexi threat and had, upon their return, decided to give aid and protection to their new family. The two of them had grown up together, gone to space together, and now they enlisted in the Terran Republic Fleet together. They were seventeen when training started, and videos of the training of the two survivors of the Horizons as pilots was widely broadcast as propaganda to the federation, pertaining to the strength of human resolve and loyalty.<br/>The ships they intended to pilot were not the Lancer-class Corvettes, the Gladius-class frigates, the claymore-class destroyers, or the flamberge-class battleships. No, for these two all that would do was the Sabers. The fighters armed with swarm rockets, twin tri-barrel heavy railguns, single antimatter torpedo, maximal inertial dampening and acceleration, plus maneuverability beyond anything previously imagined by the federation in a military craft. Minimal armor and low-grade deflection shielding. Dembra were horrified by the lack of armor, the Nathians by the speeds involved, and the Ivari by the….well, everything. Inertia on such acceleration would have killed them, even with the dampening.<br/><br/>Jake and Callie developed a number of truly stupid maneuvers in training. Required survival training on planets without friendly populace, using only the crash kit. Hand to hand combat with vibro-sabers and the coil-burst pistol that were issued to pilots for personal defense in the event of a crash. When they graduated, the two of them were sworn in and given a special command. The public face of the Terran Federation navy among the Nathians, they were also responsible for a number of maneuvers in the playbook that even other humans thought was insane. They were sworn into special command unit 588, to be issued Sabers with some prototypal upgrades, which they could modify aesthetically as a signature. They were told that other humans would be permitted to join the squadron if they demonstrated similar competence and lunacy.<br/>Remembering the insignia of the Nathians who’d adopted them, Jake and Callie painted theirs with scarlet and azure tiger stripes. They climbed into the specialized Sabers, initiating the engines.<br/><br/>Jake initiated the comms as they began rising. Distress signals were clocked from the colony they’d been saved by. And Tiger Squadron’s first mission would be to go to their aid. Upon the exit from the atmosphere, they punched through to FTL, and exited to find a burning hulk of a Nathian Corvette and the menacing mass of a Vulpexi dreadnaught.<br/><br/>The battle was vicious and spectacular. Sling-shotting around moons, dancing around point defense, and unleashing for the first time the antimatter warheads against a city-sized enemy craft to break it to pieces. Upon a second crash landing the Nathians welcomed them back. Namna, their adoptive sister.<br/>Malida, the matriarch of this Family, embraced them. “Thanks for coming back.”<br/><br/>Callie laughed, madly. “Of course, mom. You helped us when we needed it.” The Nathians let them eat and rest there for old times sake, as they had two years ago, before the <br/>two of them put up the pickup beacons. Based on the damage to their ships, and what they’d just pulled off, Jake estimated their odds of medal and court martial being about equal. “But hey. We won. And the Vulpexi learned something.”<br/><br/>Callie leaned in and smiled, “What’s that?”<br/><br/>“They learned that Nathians are off limits. And they got an idea of what humans are capable of.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Superior Talent and Insanity</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>It should be noted now that the previous chapter and this one describe the same battle, though in the previous chapter I was making notes on the basis of what I was told or what had been written by the pilots. This chapter is drawn more heavily from footage and the official report of events. – Endirmas Blorgi, Historian.</em>
</p><p>The Vulpexi dreadnought and its attached craft were getting closer and closer to the Nathia colony. The gentle mammals were Federation members but their warrior caste were few and far between, and the citizens of the colony worried. They had weapons good enough to stand off pirates but against Vulpexi Imperial Troops they stood no chance. So Nathia parents held their children and the crew of the singular corvette the otter-like beings boarded and prepared to stand off the invaders as long as they could.<br/><br/>The enemy dreadnought closed into the system, laying waste to satellite defenses and the evacuation platforms. The Nathian corvette fired off its missiles, gauss guns, everything it had, desperately dodging around the heavier firepower of the Vulpexi guns, until finally, it fell, blazing through the atmosphere as a mound of burning slag, as though signaling the fate of everyone in the colony.<br/><br/>Two new hyperspace signatures entered the system, pulsing with Federation comm stylings. The voice that came through wasn’t of a fleet officer though. Nor was it even remotely disciplined. It was, however, familiar to the young Nathian operating the beacon, hoping desperately for help.<br/><br/>“Don’t worry guys, cavalry’s here.” The image on the beacon monitor showed two human fighters, whose guns shouldn’t be able to scratch the Vulpexi ship. Instead of the usual black and chrome, these ships were painted in scarlet and azure tiger stripes.<br/><br/>The young Nathian officer remembered where he’d seen those designs before, where he’d heard that voice. There had been a pair of young humans from a destroyed colony ship who’d been on the colony before. His family had taken them in when they needed it, and when they’d been picked up by other humans, they’d remembered. Now, two humans in fighters were going to do something insane and stupid to repay that. He wished he could tell them to protect themselves, but….<br/>*******<br/>The Vulpexi Fleet commander Taras, Commander at the helm of the Titan saw the two strange fighters on his screens, and received the hailing. On his screen was a human face. Taras had fought humans before, and knew they could be unpredictable. But this was insanity. “Vulpexi. You are threatening a peaceful colony under our protection. Depart at once.” The Vulpexi laughed and flashed them the images of the destroyed corvette. “Let me rephrase that. You have attacked our adoptive families, you are facing superior talent and tenacity, and you have sixty seconds to declare your unconditional surrender.”<br/><br/>The Vulpexi ship charged its weapons, then lost track of where the fighters were. They flew at nearly impossible angles and dodged around the guns meant to tear apart heavier ships. The shields of the Titan should have stopped their fighters getting in close, but to the shock of the Vulpexi, (and horror of the Nathians) the human pilots simply brought their shields in as close as they could, allowing flight through enemy shields but rendering themselves completely vulnerable to enemy weapon systems.<br/>Taras chuckled as the two humans launched swarm rockets. The hairless apes were tenacious, but the point defenses would stop all of the rockets before they reached the ship. Especially at that range. Only when he saw the rockets intercepted and the distinctive flashes of ionized fire that trailed human gauss rounds and saw his point defenses go offline did he realize he’d made a mistake. That had been a diversion.<br/><br/>Saber fighters had one more trick. One that it was nearly suicidal to use, especially inside an enemy’s shields. It was more for suicide blasts when captured than anything else, in fact. It wasn’t considered practical for anything else. Each carried a singular, 10 kiloton antimatter torpedo. One pilot drew fire. The other swept out of sight and under the ship, out of Taras’s sensors. He was convinced that one had been destroyed until a flash of nuclear fire cracked the defensive bow off his ship. Then the second human pilot re-appeared, dodging fire in its own turn, after the first human had disappeared. He assumed that one had been a sacrificial decoy, surely there was no way….<br/>The ship AI sounded. “Antimatter torpedo through the main reactor containment field. Critical containment failure. The Dominion will remember your sacrifice.”<br/>The two human pilots swung around the explosion, and the magnetic push of enemy shields, slingshotting themselves down towards the colony. It was an insane maneuver, and their Sabers were almost certainly going to be thrashed in the landing.<br/><br/>The Nathians picked them out of the crash sites. When they learned that these humans had sheltered there before and saw this as repayment, they didn’t know how to react beyond expressing their relief for human insanity and the fact that these two had bonded to them.<br/><br/>The Vulpexi Grand Admiral, upon receiving the final, AI-sent transmission of the Titan Dreadnought, knew exactly how to respond when his flagship was intercepted by a Federation fleet with two humans in strangely painted Sabers.<br/><br/>He offered his unconditional surrender. If two fighters could break a dreadnought, he shuddered to think of what they could do with dreadnoughts of their own.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. What are they?</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Thoughts on humanity from the arc villain's perspective</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Record of the thoughts of the Vulpexi Dominion Grand Admiral from early in his career.</p><p>Vulpexi Commander Matras watched the indicators of the fighter squadron on the outer edge of his formation blink out to be replaced with the indicator for a craft who’d lost contact. A corvette in the same wing signaled being engaged, briefly, but it too, soon flashed “contact loss”, this time signaling, confusingly, friendly fire.<br/>He deployed three more squadrons to that sector of the fleet, to counter whatever skirmishers the federation had deployed. Likely, he assumed, more of those damnable humans, the hairless apes who’d obliterated his colleague, Taras, above the colony of the Nathians. The stories of them were numerous, their refusal to be taken prisoner was well documented, up to and including firing antimatter torpedoes in close when their fighters were captured, as was their propensity for unusual tactics. The communications panel flashed, and he received the report. “There’s a destroyed corvette and a few of the fighters that the humans use. No evidence to suggest this was more than a brief skir – “ the communication cut off and the indicators for all 27 fighters dispatched to that zone suddenly noted contact lost. The supposed “Friendly fire” was likely damage inflicted on the reactor of the destroyed corvette by fighters reacting in a panic situation, in which case the Empire was better off without such fools. A sensor scan indicated no hostile contacts, no non-Vulpexi contacts at all, in that area, and while more fighters and a corvette with enhanced shielding and counter-strike craft defenses were sent to reinforce that sector. A brief flash on the indicators of that unit showed a skirmish engagement which cost a few more fighters but from which the Federation contacts withdrew or were destroyed. “Captain, report results of skirmish.”</p><p>A response of the section commander, iron discipline of the Vulpexi empire asserting itself over fear, came in. “Six human fighters scrapped. The losses after the first three were self-destructs, apparently after their pilots die the antimatter warheads are set as proximity detonation.” Matras’s eyestalks swayed slightly. Humans found a way to keep killing Vulpexi warriors even in death. The captain’s report was of some relief, however. Six other fighters had fled after the loss of the first six, which indicated that the human squadron was retreating after the loss of half the unit. “Wait. Fleet Commander…there’s two more coming in.” Federation contacts appeared on the sensor. “Fleet Commander I have visual” the other’s voice quivered in fear and the captain’s eyestalks began twisting. “They have the stripes of the Nathian clan from the colony. The ones who killed Taras…” Matras ordered the captain to hold it together, reminding him that to slay such heroes of the federation would demoralize the enemy and perhaps convince the humans that they could not withstand the Empire. The Captain ordered a mass firing of all available weapons against the small human ships, which mostly dodged them before jumping back into hyperspace, only to appear on the opposite wing, where the antimatter warheads were almost immediately launched, destroying a battleship. The two ships began flitting on and off sensors.</p><p>“What’s happening?” On the wing where the contact had initially occurred, two Pride-class battleships, of Dembra manufacture as opposed to human, appearing and beginning to deploy their heavier weapons against ships which had already fired off the last of their heavy warheads against the human fighters, and were now more or less unable to counter the heavy armor and shielding of the Dembra’s juggernaut ships.<br/>He ordered three battleships to engage against the Dembra-built ships and attempt to drive them back, however almost immediately the six human ships who’d fled began striking against the strike craft sent to engage the Dembra ships, maneuvering in ways he hadn’t realized was possible and that he was certain the Ivari had known about but had discarded as too reckless. “DAMN THEM.”</p><p>The strangely colored human craft destroyed one of his carriers by firing swarm rockets right as the enemy fighters began deploying from the hanger bays, leading to a chain reaction that broke apart the airlocks to the hangers. While many of the Vulpexi aboard that ship would likely survive in suits to be rescued if he survived this skirmish, many wouldn’t. Human craft began warping in, dancing with the heavier gunships before withdrawing and allowing heavier Dembra-built ships to engage. Finally, the remains of the initial fighter squadron were wiped away, leaving only one left, but that one proceeded to discharge his warhead at one of Matras’s last remaining battleships, to which Matras crowed, “Gods. That one was desperate.” The battleship’s point defense intercepted the warhead but the blast tore away most of the shielding, allowing the human in question to punch to warp until it impacted the bridge of the battleship, tearing it open.</p><p>“Gods of stars and deep, what are these things?” Matras was frightened now. The humans were an intelligent race but reckless, known for attacking in ways that other races considered suicide, but they usually survived. For one to simply use their own ship as a missile was lunacy. What was the point of victory when one could not savor it? The Dembra battle group was finally overwhelmed and destroyed, as were over a hundred and twenty total human fighters. However, Matras had lost just under a third of the fleet under his command. And the damned human special unit had escaped. Fleet Commander Matras messaged the Grand Admiral. “Admiral. I have engaged a fleet of six battleships, fourteen of their destroyers, and a hundred and eighty fighters. I destroyed five battleships, eight destroyers and one hundred and twenty fighters. My losses stand at 23 battleships, 43 destroyers, 61 corvettes, two hundred and thirty fighters, and a carrier craft with some surviving crew.”<br/>The Admiral swayed. “In any other war the People have fought, such uneven losses of Vulpexi warriors and craft would be unacceptable. As it stands, it is one of the few victories we have claimed from pitched battle against a combined federation battlegroup with human fighters in tow. There are presently countermeasures being developed for many of the weapons humans deploy most successfully from their fighters, however those are two standard cycles away. Maintain your advance towards the Epomi colony and engage in standard practice. If you come upon another battlegroup and do so well, withdraw to the Simalkis system and maintain position there. You will only need to hold out two cycles against any human retaliation before relief.</p><p>Matras swayed. A victory? Tens of thousands dead for next to nothing. Two cycles would be easy, normally. But humans didn’t do normal. Two cycles of holding out was likely a death sentence. But he wanted a better chance at besting them. They’d damaged his forces and inflicted a humiliating loss on the Vulpexi in Taras’s life and the first dreadnaught the Empire had deployed against the federation. He’d make it and pay the apes back, but first he would learn of them. How they’d been able to do this. How they evolved. He’d learn everything about them, every flaw in their mad thinking. And make their madness, their greatest strength, a lever to wipe them out.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Leave</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Some fluff</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>
    <span>Order issuance: Terran Republic Fleet Special Command 588: Tiger Squadron, placed on administrative leave for R&amp;R. Travel Permit: Ivari passenger transit ship, for the purpose of travel to any safe world within federation space.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>I looked at Jake. “You’re kidding me.” He was trying and failing to hide his grin. “Nope. Special order directly from the Admiral. We’ve apparently done enough damage to the Vulpexi force and are now being ordered to relax a bit. We’re getting new members at the end of the R&amp;R period, three of them. But in the aftermath of the comm records of that skirmish near Aradan getting leaked…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I glowered at him. “You’re the one who said you wanted to see if you could use the vacuum of space to suction the Vulpexi slugs out of the airlock.” He was gentlemanly enough to not mention how madly I’d laughed when the answer turned out to be yes. “So…where should we go?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake looked at me, carefully. “Is a resort at Galagan an acceptable suggestion?” I blushed a bit. “A romantic resort on a world with low gravity and easy climate?” I stared at the insignia of rank on his uniform and mine. “Speaking as your CO, the Lieutenant with only one Ensign under her command, to her right-hand officer…no.”</span>
  <span> I smiled at him, then while I was changing out of the uniform, I sent him a digital copy of the leave orders with the time our leave would officially begin highlighted with the phrase “Ask again then. I’m not having anything we do turned into some stupid love story on the nets.” I figured he’d get it. Ever since our spot of celebrity after the crash landing of the Horizons, we’d been bugged by reporters about our personal lives.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake’s message back was simply “Point. My apologies, Lt. Dala.” I rolled my eyes. I’d paid attention to rank in my refusal, he was going to be referring to me exclusively by that title until the leave initiated.  Jake and I ate in the mess and after a point I started referring to him as “Ensign Anders” to try to draw even but since he was far more into the formalities than I was this was less than effective. Other human crew on the station watched with some amusement as they always did, the few Dembra seemed vaguely baffled as to why rank would be observed in the mess. “Excuse me, young humans…I was given to understand that human belief is that rank is not observed in the “mess” or the eating quarters. Why do you two ignore your own people’s conventions?” I looked at Jake, and gave a tiny nod. His response was typical of young humans messing with the almost comically serious, honorable Dembra. “We’re flouting tradition because we’re irritated by a situation related to rank and using it sarcastically.” The Dembra engineer looked baffled by this response, and went back to their friends, who began reacting with shock to the idea that “humans violate formal informality to protest against formality.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I looked at Jake, suddenly feeling a bit guilty. “We are truly a shining example to any young human who wants to drive alien anthropologists completely insane, you know that?”</span>
  <span> he shrugged as though he couldn’t care less. “You’re the one who gave me permission, Lieutenant.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>My glower was worth a laugh. The next day we boarded a transport, carrying our sidearms and IDs, but nothing that would distinguish us from normal civilians. The Ivari aboard the transport took our money and asked where we were headed. “Galagan, Callie?” I nodded. “Yeah, Galagan. We’ve had a difficult few weeks.” The Ivari’s strange squawk that passed for laughter acknowledged this, and they plotted the course.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I turned towards Jake and quipped, “Performance reports are out. I’m currently leading you in fighter kills.” Jake laughed caustically. “Still one-upping you on corvettes.” There were stats on kills each pilot had wracked up of different types of enemy craft. Anything larger than a corvette was considered an automatic assist since absent suicide strikes nothing larger would go down to a lone fighter. Our work on the dreadnaught had already been noted and countermeasures had been put in place to prevent us from doing it again. Jake was a lot better at dodging bigger guns than I was but I was the better dogfighter.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, bite me.” Jake chuckled. “Fair. We’re on vacation. No need to think about work.” He pulled a flask of hard cider from his jacket and slipped a bit into his own drink, then asked me if I wanted some. I nodded, and the two of us sipped a bit. One of the Epomi asked us what we were drinking and I answered, this time. “Oh, just some fermented apple juice mixed with the drink.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The quadruped blinked, then asked, “Fermented…that doesn’t translate. Apples are fruits from earth…what is fermented?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It means it’s been allowed to very slightly decay in a manner that turns it somewhat alcoholic.” The Epomi’s eyes widened, had they seriously never heard of drinking? The Nathians drank a similar form of intoxicant, but it was pitifully weak by human standards…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>After the Epomi trotted off, clearly concerned about our health, a couple of Nathians came over and talked to us a bit, giving the traditional greeting, “one family.” We returned it and chatted for a bit, but they were mostly curious to see how we were doing, and apparently they belonged to our clan. Hard to find a better species than the Nathians. Sweet, focused on family, able to bond with anything, compassionate. Really all the best bits of humanity with none of the worst.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Okay so we’re a lot better at defending ourselves or others than they’ll ever be but fuck you they’re space otters who adopted us and if you talk crap about them I’ll feed you an antimatter torpedo.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake was joking with one of them, and they asked, “Is it common for human mates to fight in the same unit in battle? It’s common enough for Nathian warriors, but we were given to understand that humans consider it scandalous.”</span>
  <span> The Nathian seemed to realize that we’d both been taken aback by the question, then backpedaled. “Ah, if that is uncomfortable, I was given to understand you two were mates, and I hoped that the strange customs of the humans had not compelled a cessation of the courtship…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake looked at me and I nodded. “It…hasn’t. We’re still together. As a general rule we do treat relationships as being a bit more private than your people, and usually relationships within military units are not permitted for a variety of excellent reasons, however there’s exceptions made for married couples who enlist and get kept together, and as a special unit we get a lot of leeway we probably shouldn’t…” He broke off, and looked at me apologetically, but I just shrugged. “I mean, we lost everyone else we knew on the Horizons. Our relationship started in difficult circumstances but it’s working out okay. We know how to work together so it just made more sense not to split us up.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake looked a bit embarrassed by this, as though he wasn’t sure he’d been as sensitive about my feelings on disclosing the whole thing as he should have been. Though I’d been exactly as sensitive the last time this conversation had happened, and I wasn’t uncomfortable now, so it probably wasn’t as big a deal as it might have been. The Nathian we were talking to wrinkled her nose, and I suddenly realized she was a bit younger than we were. “Alright, well…goodbye, brother, sister.” She scampered off. I looked at him and said, in an offhand tone, “Well, I’m down to go get some rest on an actual bed, and I wouldn’t mind sharing.” The two of us headed to the strange hammocks preferred on Galaga, and slept easily, feeling more at peace than we had since the war had started.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>After months in the cold expanse of space, in our own separate bunk rooms, it felt good to hold another human for a bit, just for the contact. Being human wasn’t just about freaking out other species. It was also about moments like this. Being vulnerable around people you trusted. Keeping each other warm. Our time with the Nathians had done us both a lot of good. Cuddling isn’t considered immature or sentimental by their standards, but as a vital part of any positive relationship, be it romantic, familial, or friendly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>We were safe for each other. That’s what mattered.</span>
</p><p><span>-</span> <span>From records written by Callie Andala.</span></p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Adding that to the Playbook</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Callie and I inspected the new pilots of Tiger Squadron, having had a decent vacation on Galagan.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Our total personnel count was now standing at 17, all crazy fuckers with little to no family or who were close with a lot of the other Federation races. I was technically an ensign but we were both so over ranked I got to play sergeant rough, or since we were navy “Petty Officer” rough. “Alright, you dirtsiders think you’ve got what it takes to be Tiger Squadron? Great. That means constant inspections, media attention, the most stupid fucking missions against vastly superior firepower you’ve ever fucking seen or heard of, and oh yeah, we expect you to fucking win! So, if you lot think you can handle a Saber well enough to manage that, you will be drilled in all our unique maneuvers from 0500 Terran Standard to 1700, with only two standard hours for break. You will then do assigned book work in tactics and calls unique to our unit ‘cause no other squadron’s batshit enough to try them. CLEAR?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The newbies saluted and Callie took over. “Alright. First day, you’re all tired from a long haul out to this base. Guess what? Get in your Sabers, we’re going to see how much you’ve figured out on your own.” She grinned. “Sorry, but no rest for the wicked. Which means no rest for us either, lest they get ahead.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I was looking forward to their impression of the Tiger-Sabers, the custom-ace modified versions of the standard human fighter craft. Our standard ship models, the ones that get mass-produced for the mainline forces, are named for swords. In reference to a Vulpexi ambassador’s shock at the sheer variety of homicidal wildlife, the custom-modified models for our ships, issued to special commands only, were named for dangerous animals. The newbies jumped into their new ships, and we began going over a variety of maneuvers. After coming to the conclusion that they did, in fact, have a pretty good handle on the tactics we used, Callie and I had a private conference on the officer’s comm channel. “UH…okay what the fuck do we do now? We were told they’d need training and clearly we were lied to.” Callie answered my inquiry by patching into the main comm frequency and saying, “My ensign brings up an interesting point, we were told you hadn’t been given any training in this beyond standard, and with the clear contradiction to this now staring us in the face, we’re going to go over some features of the Tiger Saber you should be familiar with. First off, acceleration is much sharper, and inertial dampening on turns is a lot harder. Further, you can choose to bring shields in significantly closer to the craft, allowing you to get inside enemy shields, with the understanding that you will have exactly zero chance of survival if they land a glancing hit at that point.” The troopers whistled, but to my alarm the idea seemed to mostly excite them.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Callie asked where they had gotten the training, to which the answer was that they watched vids of our maneuvers and practiced mimicking them. “Alright then. I’ll show you all another cool feature. Your saber cockpit also contains a kick-ass sound system, which is thoroughly non-regulation, and will be overcut by comms, but we will teach you how to program that to play decent pump-up music because god knows after spending three days straight on patrol with nothing but combat stims to keep you conscious you will need that to keep you focused.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Federation Military Personnel, alert. Attack on Bentim-3, Vulpexi slavers. Request assistance.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Callie barked out an order and we punched to FTL to engage the Vulpexi raiding party. Over a channel that would be broadcast to the planet I snapped out the order, “Tiger squadron, FANGS OUT.”   </span>
</p><p>
  <span>*****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>An Epomi at the data-relay banks blinked. “They have fangs? Aren’t they scary enough?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>******</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A few fighters came apart easily, but the squadron was baffled by how to engage corvette now that it was hovering above the ground. It could do a lot of damage to the planet if we were to hit it with an antimatter torpedo, which was sorta our go-to for anything other than fighters. A trio of the newbies solved our conundrum with a maneuver that…well…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They swooped down through the atmosphere, dialing all their shields to the front. Fine. What they then did is snap up at a 45 degree angle from the ground, but maintain thrust such that they’d travel directly horizontal at a range of 20 meters or less above the slaving party that had just gone to the surface, while firing up at the belly of the corvette with rockets and gauss guns until it came apart. The radioactive backwash of the thrust itself burned out the slavers, slagging them into…well…goo.  - Jake Andala.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>******</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Watching the footage of what the human pilots had done, we of the Epomi sent a message to the officers in charge of Tiger Squadron. That move at the end had to have been insane, even by human standards. We sent the footage and inquired as to the discipline that would be taken such that in the future, the humans would not act with such disregard for their own lives, as surely even beings that had come into being on a death world would agree that life should not be recklessly gambled.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The message back made us weep in terror.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Discipline? Reckless? It worked, didn’t it? Their current orders are to teach the rest of the squadron how the hell they managed that. We’re adding it to the playbook.” – Records of communication between Epomi and Tiger Squadron.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Human Pride</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>
    <span>The following is the record left by the Dominion Ambassador of his attempt to get the humans to surrender</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>As the Speaker to Savages</span>
  <span> appointed by the Vulpexi Grand Tribunal, I expected somewhat more consideration than this. My ship had docked at a safe distance from the human homeworld, but their damned special unit, this “tiger squadron” I’d heard so much about, were deployed nearby to, presumably, burn my ship down if I attempted anything. How dare they. I had convinced the Grand Tribunal that they were not to be annihilated, convinced them to send me with terms, and this was how they treated me? </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Upon arrival to earth, the human heads of state I would be meeting with took me to a strange human institution called a “zoo.” I saw things there. Strange beasts, striped feline, which I was told with a mocking grin I should find “familiar.” I didn’t understand, but the human explained to me that the species I was looking at were known as “tigers” and pointed out the similarities between their skins and the designs painted on the craft of the special unit. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I was shown other feline, called “Lions” and large, lumbering predators called “Bears” strange canine known as “wolves” and so many others. The sheer variety of life on this backward, vicious planet boggled the mind, I have no shame in admitting it. Humans were powerful, proud fools that they could live here. I was glad I had talked the Tribunal into sparing them. They would be excellent additions to the empire, and they were clearly in need of Vulpexi wisdom if they were mad enough to leave things that dangerous running around.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Eventually, after seeing “Rhinoceros” which they had, for some reason, resurrected with genetic engineering after the behemoths had been hunted to extinction some 200 years ago, I was entirely convinced. The other Federation races had taken shameless advantage of a race of complete lunatics and once I gave my offer they would doubtless be able to be brought over to our side, acknowledging their proper place.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When I finally stood in front of the Assembly of the Terran Union, I gave my terms, the ones I’d begged the Tribunal to allow. “Our people have been too long at war, and there have been many tragic deaths on both sides of the conflict. However, the Vulpexi Tribunal have been convinced of something, watching you fight, and my own observations here certainly confirm it. You are not enemies of the Vulpexi, you are in fact, perfect additions to our Dominion. The Federation were cruel in taking advantage of your bonding tendencies in hopes of setting you up to fight a war you could not win on their behalf, but we are willing to forgive your past transgressions against us.” There were murmurs around the room, humans likely had no idea of the generosity of the Dominion. I was told to continue. “In exchange, we would request a large number, no more than a few million, of your children under the age of 3 galactic standard time cycles, or a span of time equal to eight revolutions of your world around its star, to our world to serve as members of Vulpexi households, to be proof of human ability to learn a position within the Vulpexi Dominion, and since it has been observed that your children, like most, are the most malleable…” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>I was cut off by a roar of rage, and screams that, if translation worked properly, called for a truly hideous end to me, and for the first time I felt afraid. A quick show of hands ordered in a rapid-fire set of statements in the human standard dialect, and the head of the Assembly turned towards me, face, I saw to my horror, a mask of rage.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This is the offer of the Vulpexi Dominion? That we be willing to sign over several million of our children as slaves to your empire to show that we can learn to serve you? Never. Here is our offer to you, Vulpexi, deluded, self-proclaimed masters of the galaxy. Return any slaves of any federation race you have taken to their families with full reparations. Withdraw your fleets and armies from our space. And never let us sight you within our territory again. We reject your offer utterly, and if you claim that such subjugation of our people to you is the only way we will know peace with you, I speak for our entire race when I say that we would sooner have war without end. But there will be an end, you revolting slugs. Yours. If you demand slavery or genocide, the galaxy shall see a genocide. You will be wiped off of every planet you occupy, every ship you have between the stars broken, every colony you have attacked by human armies until each and every one of you has been dug out and destroyed.</span>
  <span> Your homeworld will drift as a lifeless ball of glass and rock forever, a solemn testament to the fate of those who would enslave or murder our race or any of its allies. Go home to your masters, and never come again. Tell them we reject their “peace.” Tell them to gird for war, and that the entire human race is coming for them. Go.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I couldn’t believe it. The savage was threatening to eradicate us. Completely. As if it could. As if it had the right. “You hairless apes will beg for the mercy you’ve been offered today when you grovel before us as lesser races were bred to, human.” The humans laughed. And said that they hadn’t sought this war. But we had, and they’d see our race perish if we didn’t call it quits. Arrogant fools…and yet…they’d survived this long on a world of murderous wildlife and strange atmosphere. They were capable of surviving things that should have killed them. They were brutal, unpredictable, and did better in skirmishes than we thought possible. Maybe, just maybe, they could survive us.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I dismissed that as the nervous reaction to seeing their barbaric rage and arrogant defiance, at the time.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>In the fighting I’ve seen since, I have come to fear their arrogance was the justified one.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. First Defeat</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>
    <span>The first component of this chapter is taken from the writings and records of Matras, both the Admiral himself and his biographer, and the second is the verbatim-quoted orders delivered by then Star Marshal and later President of the Terran Republic, Maria Gonzalez.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Matras’s eyestalks swiveled with glee as the first wave of human fighters swept into the shields of the corvettes, the countermeasures he’d developed now deployed. True, the pulses automatically fired weren’t perfect and some of the fighters would manage to evade them, however most would be hanging helplessly still or slow enough to be easily targeted and destroyed well before their engines came back online. Point defenses savaged the first wave of the enemy sabers, and Matras considered, not for the first time, how easy it had been to draw them in. Reckless, unpredictable, but they were willing to stick to the same tactics that had worked for them in the past.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His heavier dreadnaughts began hammering the ground defenses, keeping the majority of his fighter component in reserve. When the second and third waves of fighters swept to stop the drop ships and orbital bombardment, respectively, his fighter contingent pounced en masse. While he could clearly see that the humans were proving the superior pilots and taking two or three of his fighters to every one they lost, his fighters outnumbered theirs six to one, and before the enemy could deploy any further countermeasure, Tyrsian shock troops, with heavy power armor, coil guns and brutal scything shock-swords would be on the ground, alongside a full hive of Kilicks, the insectile swarm race whose queens the Vulpexi had seized control of generations ago through careful use of genetic modification.</span>
  
</p><p>
  <span>He let the Tyrsian captain handle that, those reptilian brutes knew ground warfare better than he, they’d adapted to it with their thick hides, massive muscles and reinforced bones, where the Vulpexi had become as good at training and later, altering other species to serve as slaves to begin with because their molluscoid bodies could not handle many of the strains that went into heavy labor. And they’d been a bunch of war-mongering barbarians before the Vulpexi had come to uplift them. Believing the Vulpexi were gods and capable of ground warfare, the Vulpexi empire had truly begun to take off with that acquisition some three centuries ago.</span>
  
</p><p>
  <span>The Dembra forces began cracking his corvettes and battleships, and in response he sent a few boarding units, the Sclunter, a species known for agility and difficulty to control prior to the advent of microchip processing. They were only perfectly controllable for a very short period of time, after which the chips tended to lobotomize them. Slipping aboard Dembra craft, while a handful of human units tried to stop them, breaking the boarding craft and spilling Sclunter forces into the unforgiving vacuum of space, even as the Dembra guns cost him a few more of his ships, only to suddenly seize as the antimatter demolition charges the Sclunter had sent tore into the reactor cores of the Dembra ships, tearing them apart. The boarding craft were mostly destroyed, and he would get no Sclunter back, but that was fine. They bred fast and the Dembra bred slowly, he could replace those boarding units far more easily than they could replace such massive ships and crew. Refugee ships began shuttling off planet, and flicking his ragellum viciously, Matras gave the order to a corvette unit to attack the refugee ships, knowing full well that they weren’t likely to actually stop the refugees.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Those weren’t the target. What remained of the human force broke from the fleet and began to attempt to shield the refugees, only to fall prey to Matras’s gunships, though they took several dozen with them. The Dembra fought bravely, but eventually, even their discipline and courage broke and they fled. About half of the civilian populace of Dacas II would escape, the Tyrsian captain was ringing him now. “My lord, the enemy soldiers have been brought down. We took about eight percent casualties among Tyrsians, the Kilicks took about 40 percent. The human soldiers died to the last, about a hundred and twenty thousand dead. We’re rounding up the surviving human civilians, though they’re fighting back, it’s mostly laughable…” the transmission cut and came back a few moments later. “They’re tenacious and have some home-made explosives, but they’re getting mopped up.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Matras crowed in triumph. The first victory of the Vulpexi-federation war, his. It had cost him just under half a million Kilicks and about twelve thousand Tyrsians. Also about 15 thousand Vulpexi, but they could easily recover the losses of Kilicks and the Tyrsian leadership were very good at keeping losses sustainable using more expendable units. His own Vulpexi losses were mostly conscripts and those who’d been loyal to the coward he’d replaced, so limited value losses. If he had seized just under a million humans as slaves to be brought into the empire, more than enough for a sustainable breeding population, they’d be able to deploy humans against their own, and see what the mad death worlders would do then.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>——-</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Terran Republic’s paramount military leader, Star Marshal Maria Gonzalez, took in the report from the fall of Dacas IV, the colony that had been hit in concentration by a massed Vulpexi fleet commanded by the Vulpexi’s new Admiral. The last one had been fragged by its own troops when it had tried to surrender to the Fleet, and the new one, this Matras according to the Ivari spy ships, had massed and torn Third Armada to pieces with newly developed tricks, while reports were still muddled it could be confirmed that this included countermeasures to the fighter tactic of “tucking” shields to be able to close with enemy capitol craft, via some pulse system that scrambled fighter systems for a few minutes after they did so, meaning that they would be torn to pieces by point defense.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Dembra craft had stayed on to help evacuate as many of their human comrades but ultimately had been destroyed or driven off, especially when Vulpexi boarding units had gotten aboard and promptly used suicide bombs against the reactors after crawling around through the ducts.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The colony at Dacas IV, some three million men, women and children, had been destroyed. About 1.2 million civilians had been evacuated, after three or four divisions of Human and Dembra soldiers had given their lives buying time for the evacuation. Enemy forces were occupying the planet and while the Ivari were pretty clear that not all of the fighting had finished, the Vulpexi were most definitely planning on taking human civilians as slaves for their empire, Gonzalez had little to no illusion that most of the people on that world would be wiped out.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The good news was that a new, special unit of ground troops had been established. Ones who were to the Terran Marines what Tiger Squadron was to the average Saber pilot. Wolf Regiment was composed of about 1200 complete maniacs who’d proven more capable, deadly and vicious than average and had been transferred to a new unit. The Vulpexi ambassador had been shocked enough by the wildlife at the zoo during its visit, and as a result, special units had been named after dangerous animals as a taunt to remind the Vulpexi of everything else their race had survived.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She transmitted the orders to the Second Armada, and arranged for the Lion Fleet, the specialized corvette and battleship task force, to engage with and drive the Vulpexi forces out of that system. Further, she issued orders that two armies were to be sent to retake the planet, deploying the new Grizzly Tanks against the enemy ground forces, with orders that no Tyrsian or Killick was to leave alive. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>For Wolf Regiment, and Tiger Squadron, she had a different objective. The Vulpexi had a major hub of governance not far from the main force’s objective. Tiger Squadron and Wolf Regiment’s orders:</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tiger Squadron is to engage orbital defenses of Barmix II, and once clear, are to engage Vulpexi on the ground using any weapons they see fit. Wolf Regiment is to drop on the enemy force, inflicting as much damage and as many casualties as possible. Your goal is to force the enemy to bring their force back to drive you off, at which point you are to withdraw. This is a terror mission, and launched in retribution for Dacas IV. It is more importantly, part of a strategy to be able to retake the planet and rescue what humans still remain there. Fight bravely and show no mercy.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>                               Maria Gonzalez </span>
</p><p>
  <span>                                               Star Marshall, Terran Republic Military.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Counterstrike</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>My first real run with the crazy bastards on one of the missions they’d claimed were the point of the unit was the raid on Barmix. Lt. Callie had briefed us en route. “Our mission is to eliminate any orbital defenses of this planet so that Wolf Regiment can drop, then cause as much chaos as we can on the ground to keep their orbital guns occupied. Our usual “close contact with the corvettes” is not going to work as well as usual, Jake and I have a plan, you are to imitate our actions if our first attempt is successful. We’re paying these slugs back for Dacas, so fry the fuckers as fast as you can.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Upon exiting hyperspace, I heard Ens. Jake give his usual call. “Tiger squadron, fangs out!” there were a handful of defense stations loaded with fighter craft which quickly deployed to counter our presence, however in order to launch the fighters out of the bays the shields had to be lowered in that area, and we quickly fired our antimatter warheads into those gaps, blowing apart the satellite stations. A few enemy squadrons made it out, and we wheeled to engage them as a mobile patrol unit of a corvette and a few dozen other fighters moved to engage us.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The LT and the Ensign swept in, Jake tucking his shields along the belly of his craft and entering the enemy shielded zone and firing the torp to shred the enemy ship, then simply sitting there, hoping to god Callie could cover him…and somehow, she did. “Alright, so if you lot couldn’t tell, my plan did not work the way I hoped, we’re going to be working some other route of countering that, but for now it’s fine. Keep taking out the defenses.” The squadron plummeted through their atmosphere, ripping the enemy signal stations and missile pods apart, then informing the Wolf Regiment carrier craft, Lupa, that it was safe to begin the drop.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Dropping from orbit was another thing the other Federation races couldn’t believe about us. The bosses were laughing madly as they fell on the enemy territory, firing off rockets, the Lieutenant’s antimatter warhead, and even their standard gauss cannons at the support structures of buildings. This was a straight up destruction operation, and we probably killed thirty thousand Vulpexi units before the troopers dropped. After they did, it was back to orbit to cover them against any reinforcements. A single Vulpexi government craft attempted to lift off and escape the carnage to be blasted out of the sky. This was a terror raid. They were going to pay for what they’d done to Dacas.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>*****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Wolf regiment dropped. The boys and girls of tiger squadron took the enemy defenses to pieces and we fell on that planet like the mailed fist of fucking god. We leapt out of the drop pods, coming out shooting. Vulpexi, Tyrsians, Kilicks, we’d seen them all, we knew where to aim. A squad or so went into a Killick nest with the shredder flachettes and the flamethrowers, came back out to confirm the queen was dead and the eggs burned away. Tyrsians in power armor took some killing but when they had the lighter gear they wore on friendly planets they held up to a little steel-backed depleted uranium teardrop ripping through them at .12c as well as humans, which is to say…they blew to blood-colored, in their case, purple mist from hydrostatic shock. The rounds were only 3mm wide and about a centimeter long, but they were packing kinetic force equal to a mortar round.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Speaking of mortars, the auto-firing shoulder-mounted grenade launchers flinging micronuclear rounds that would hit at about the blast power of a half-kiloton to land about sixty klicks away were also delightful.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That was our time. Burning everything that moved. Vulpexi, Tyrsian, Killick, any of the slave races who’d been programmed beyond salvage, and the Ivari had briefed us on which ones, (according to them, most non-federations had been absorbed long enough ago that they had chips planted in their heads at birth) While we didn’t inflict wanton destruction on them, neither did we make any particular effort to restrain the carnage.</span>
  <span> If it was a structure, it got blasted. If it was eggs, it burned. The comms from the Lupa came in. “Tiger Squadron says enemy units coming in hot. Get to the beacon.” We scrambled towards the beacon, actinic fire raging around us, a few of us falling… We ran back, enemy guns ripping into armor, forcing us to work in teams to carry our wounded, we got back to the Lupa, and took off, launching the last of our grenades back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>We’d lost a hundred or so of the twelve hundred who’d come…Tiger squadron had lost six pilots, but they too, had gotten away, leaving destruction in their wake, after scores of enemy ships had come to drive off the raid.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Alright, everyone, let’s hope the Armada’s doing well in retaking Dacas.” We pulled back to the station to re-supply as the enemy began desperately attempting to settle the chaos on that Barmix II. An Ivari beacon noted the presence of a slave-processing facility on a nearby moon, and Tiger Squadron’s officers hailed the Lupa. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey, if you guys are up to clear out that facility and extract any prisoners, let’s do it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>*****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Callie and I were trying to deal with the fact that for the first time, we’d taken losses, but the Ivari intel was too important to pass up. We attacked the facility, tearing through what little anti-ship and anti-drop defenses it had, letting Wolf regiment drop in and clear the building, grab any and all units aboard, fending off any fighters called in to stop the attack. A few hours in, I was getting tired, “Callie, watch your six!” the fighter that had been trailing her ripped apart under my guns, only for my shields to get flashed, the sensors screaming that I was now exposed. As two more fighters lined up their shots, I spun my ship, trying to get away, knowing it was doubtful, when both of them burned under Callie’s attack. “For fuck’s sake, Jake, be careful.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Got it, sorry. Let’s go help the others.” She signaled in the affirmative. Then more enemy forces warped in, and I cursed. “Goddamn let’s hope it’s going better on Dacas.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>We were clearing out the processing plant, carefully, and we quickly grabbed the captives in the area. They didn’t tally at more than a few hundred, human kids, Nathians, Epomi, one or two Dembra. “Alright, we’re Wolf Regiment, Tiger Squadron’s covering us from orbit, let’s get the hell out of here!” The locals were too shocked to respond verbally and merely followed us back to the Lupa. “GET US OUT OF HERE!” The pilot punched it, and Tiger Squadron punched out once we were clear.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A few of the troopers, medics especially, were checking over the rescued civilians on the way back. The kids seemed especially relieved to be somewhere safe. Nathian pups were more reassured that the Tiger Squadron units were nearby, but they knew they were fine. The Epomi were nervous around predators but the Dembra seemed relaxed and grateful. “I’m Col. Jaeger, I’m the commander of the Terran Republic Army special command, Wolf Regiment. We’re going to take you all home.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Good as it always felt to fight against the Vulpexi…it’s moments like this that really make you feel like a hero. Protecting the ones who need it. The Vulpexi don’t get that, don’t get how hard core humans get to protect each other, our friends.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s why we’re the toughest species out there.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tiger Squadron, Wolf Regiment: Joint Operation, AAR</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Operation: Dolittle against Barmix II was a success with limited casualties for us. Enemy fleet diverted to defend the planet, on which we had just inflicted widespread property, material, and heavy civilian and military casualties. We engaged a target of opportunity in the Araxis system, a slave processing facility from which we rescued some four hundred captives and destroyed the facility. Mission successful, returning to base for refugee healthcare, refuel and re-arm.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>                                               Col. Jaeger and Lt. Dala.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. Taking it Back</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Matras pulsated with glee as a second human Armada dropped out of warp, and began hammering away at his fleet. Two of them in one centi-cycle? This was the end of the Human fleet. His dreadnaughts preformed favorably, blasting away at the enemy forces, noting that dozens of his ships had been destroyed in the opening assault but knowing he still outgunned the human fleet catastrophically.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A pincer maneuver was underway against one dreadnaught that was struggling to compensate against dozens of destroyers, and eventually that dreadnaught blew apart, only for the destroyers to find his own gunships pounding them until they had to fall back, desperately trying to disengage behind a curtain of fire from the human frigates. His own communications systems screamed at him that the enemy were closing on Barxim II, a raid that was causing widespread devastation. Further, the human force known as “Tiger Squadron” as well as one whom the code-slicing intelligence reported was the ground combat equivalent, were present. Detailing a sizeable force of corvettes and fighters to go capture, isolate and butcher the invaders, he realized quickly that this was going to leave him drastically understrength, then twisted in the exosuit and ordered the Vulpexi crew aboard the transport ships of the captured humans to abandon ship, doing so whilst maneuvering those to be in clear view of human scanners.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The human force pushed troop transports in to capture the ships and save any prisoners the hated Vulpexi had taken only to have the reactor’s kill-switch activated the moment the enemy marines boarded the craft. He estimated that a few battalions of enemy troops had been lost in those blasts, and the escort craft were cut to pieces by his own lancer frigates. “Take the forwardmost gunships and engage their battleships, trapezoidal snare formation, pull the corvettes under their cruiser units and attack their bellies, once you’ve occupied them and brought down their point defenses get more of the Sclunter suicide units in there to plant the charges. The humans will learn to respect the Vulpexi Empire!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Admiral Lara Ashford was becoming frustrated. “Sentinel point defense only against enemy missiles, manned point defense go offline until the enemy suicide units expose themselves, we will NOT lose any more ships to those fucking chimp dogs. Katanas, I want a sheet of fire against those forward gunship maneuver, counter-envelop and remember that there’s no limit to dimensions you can maneuver in in space. Lancers, your torpedoes are to focus fire on breaking the enemy dreadnaught.” A flash of fire washing across the bridge shields revealed her own flagship had come under attack by an enemy destroyer that had been blasted away. “Longswords, get into the fray and rip the hostile corvettes to pieces, the battleship guns don’t fire on their own, suppress enemy advance.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The general of Third Corps, sent to retake the planet on the ground signaled the slave transport from which the Vulpexi were evacuating, likely hoping to simply reclaim them once the battle was won. In the meantime, the ground forces began attempting to board so the prisoners could not be murdered by the enemy when they retreated.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When the craft blew and took several battalions with it, the human outcry was audible through all the comms. The ground units dropped and began securing the planet, cutting down enemy forces, mowing down Kilicks and burning out their nests, engaging Tyrsian troops who were attempting to fight back. Enemy heavy armored vehicles began engaging the human marines and were quickly boarded and blown apart with charges planted on their reactors and munitions magazines.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Admiral Ashford and General Ambrose</span>
  <span> were coordinating, slowly pushing back the Vulpexi units on ground and in space, and when the Tyrsian forces began seizing civilians to use as hostages, the human soldiers began closing with them, using their own vibro-blades to get through the massive armor of Tyrsian shock-troops and cutting them down, dodging in too closely for the enemy’s massive blades or artillery like fire-arms.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Matras was getting contacted by his Tyrsian general and quickly realized the battle on the ground was rapidly becoming untenable. “Alright, pull back. Leave the Kilicks to slow the enemy down and pull back. We’ll discuss how these hairless apes managed to get in close to you or match you despite being a third your size but for now, pull back. Get to the shuttles, and exit.” His own forces in space were faring little better, after having to send most of his reserve away to halt the raid on Barmax II he was running out of ships who hadn’t expended most of their heavy weapons. It was turning into a battle of attrition and he wasn’t willing to lose two thirds of his forces to rout the Human attack. He ordered the general retreat, laying mines to prevent any enemy pursuit.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“All units, fall back. They took the tactical victory, but we learned what we needed to from them about their strategic shortcomings.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>*****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Second Armada and Third Corps of the Terran Republic military reclaimed Dacas IV, and with the full control of the planet re-established, they began helping survivors rebuild. The Dembra offered to help rebuild the structures, the Epomi and Ivari delivered food and medicine shipments, and soon, the Nathians landed and began assisting in the aid effort. Refugee camps were established and eventually, Dacas IV was re-established as a Federation colony.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The cost to the Vulpexi had been painful, but the Vulpexi’s empire spanned hundreds of worlds and would likely be able to replenish the losses.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The humans had taken far, far fewer losses numerically, but the pilots, ships, vehicles and troops they lost would be far harder to replace. This was heavy on the mind of Star Marshal Gonzalez. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Matras reviewed the reports. They’d lost Dacas and the raid had been a feint, as expected. The loss of a slave processing facility on a nearby moon was irritating, but it answered a few questions about the strategic impact of human ethos, which was worth noting. Humans were more than willing to expend greater investments in troops, material and ships to defend their own at any ratio, even ones that were not strategically viable. This could be exploited, and moving forward, that was how he’d break them.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0012"><h2>12. A Dembra's Thoughts on Human Special Units</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Official Report, Dembra Marshal Baeman, to the Chiefs of the Dembra Union</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Re: Human “Special Command” Units</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Section 1: Tiger Squadron</span>
</p><p>
  <span>This is a unit flying the human single-occupant craft, “Saber” fighters, with special modifications, and special coloration in patterns designed to mimic those of a dangerous predator native to the human homeworld. Their weaponry and craft are standard for human fighter units, save some small modifications they refer to as a “kick-ass sound system.” What is non-standard is the limited personnel, standard “Squadrons” usually contain at least fifty craft and pilots, this one contains (at present, though their turnover and growth rates are both high) 28 pilots. It is led by two humans known as Lieutenant Callie Dala and Ensign Jake Anders, who are noteworthy for gaining such rank at an age of only 7 galactic cycles, barely considered “of age” by human standards, and for surviving the wreck of the humans’ first deep-space colony craft, the Horizons mk I, and being adopted by the Nathians, for whom they show special affection. They are further known for being a massive booster of morale, keeping their communications broadcast on any planet they are defending so that the locals know they are present.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They are specialized as skirmish pilots and are known for maneuvers that even other human pilots deem excessively “showy” and reckless, and having seen some of the evolutions they attempt I tend to agree with this analysis. However, despite a comparatively high casualty rate (20% turnover) they maintain high morale, this despite heavily encouraging initiative in subordinate pilots, and have consistently come out ahead in any clash with the Vulpexi. </span>
</p><ol>
<li><span> Lionheart Fleet</span></li>
</ol><p>
  <span>One fourth the standard strength in ship components of a standard Terran Republic Armada, this fleet has received extreme upgrades in armor and shielding as well as drives, often engaging as a rapid-response fleet that can shore up a losing naval battle. It often deploys as mobile reserve, and uses experimental FTL drives to be able to arrive promptly at any battle zone within the Disputed Sector. These ships deploy primarily experimental weapons with devastating success, and are known for having driven a Vulpexi strike force of roughly twice their size out of the Aradan system. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Their current leader is a human individual named Commander Shiloh Hendrix, who has thus far shown good tactical sense and maintained excellent discipline in the face of hostile forces and sub-optimal engagement conditions.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>III. Wolf Regiment</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Currently led by a human named Colonel Hann Jaegar, this is a specialized infantry unit that is issued specialized power armor and weapons. Formed entirely of volunteers from the standard armies of the Terran Republic who demonstrate greater than average valor in other commands, this is rapidly becoming known as the most dangerous human ground combat unit seen in the conflict. Their kill counts are truly astronomical and if it weren’t for the fact that they were humans the reports verifying them would beggar belief. Their commander himself is a hardened veteran of a number of campaigns against fellow humans prior to the species gaining FTL travel, and had seen boarding action against Vulpexi slavers mistaken for pirates prior to the official beginning of hostilities. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They deploy using what humans refer to as Orbital Drop Assault tactics, which consist of climbing into a pod in full gear and being fired from orbit onto the planet below, with some form of device to increase drag, which they refer to as a parachute, being deployed to slow their fall. Upon exit, they immediately begin laying waste. Their weapons are not substantively different from those of other human infantry, though there is some speculation that “Marines” of Wolf Regiment modify their gear slightly, a process humans refer to as “tinkering.” What this means I am uncertain but they are both frightening and effective. They have participated in large-scale raids across this conflict and are frequently used to extract any Vulpexi captives on recently captured worlds, as well as serving the purpose that humans refer to as “destabilizing the rear echelon” meaning that they are frequently dropped in behind enemy lines on a planet being disputed to hit the enemy fortifications and defenders from behind.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Section IV. Units in creation</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I have heard reports from humans pertaining to armored vehicles or modified power armor which will be called “Rhino Tanks” and “Ursa Gear” respectively, however beyond “heavy weapons platform for infantry” for the latter and “Super-heavy armored vehicle” for the former I can say little as to what these will take. Knowing what we do of the humans, it’s likely to be alarming. There is also apparently some form of stealth unit being formed called the Viper Teams, though what those will look like is likely to be anyone’s guess.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>I have further heard stories, which were confirmed to my great alarm, of a small cleaning robot known as a “roomba” aboard the flagship of their Fourth Armada, which had a knife attached to its chassis with adhesive tape, and is now affectionately referred to as “Stabby” and has been given the honorary rank of quartermaster. The rank was explained to be primarily a joke, however the presence of this shipboard hazard is entirely beyond doubt. The humans on said ship have steadfastly refused to decommission it, though they have admitted to sealing it out of battle-stations or critical personnel areas during battle. I have heard rumors that it did once delay a Sclunter boarding unit long enough for the shipboard security to arrive, however I suspect the humans must be joking about that. I hope not, however, their insistence on maintaining such a hazard aboard their ship makes little enough sense even given that. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>For all that, their race is most assuredly among the most impressive warriors of the galaxy, and I would be honored to fight alongside any of them, however mad they may be.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0013"><h2>13. Club Scene</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Contradictions. Also fuck public speaking.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>The human officer’s club was a strange and alarming place. That was the only thing the Ivari stationmaster overseeing the room could truly say after watching the human special commands meet up. Lion Fleet’s Commander Shiloh Hendrix was present, as were both Jake and Callie of Tiger Squadron. Col. Jaegar of Wolf Regiment, the scion of the warrior class that had done the Prussian peoples proud for centuries, cropped gold hair and eyes cold and blue as the deep between the stars, was chatting up Sgt. Adisa, a tall woman, with sparkling amber eyes and skin the color of polished jet, a fact she had pointed out in choosing her callsign, “Mamba” appropriate for the leader of less-than-openly-admitted to Viper team,</span>
  <span> a small, elite units of humans who specialized in assassination and who were noted for having eliminated several Vulpexi leadership. With or without power armor, she was likely the deadliest individual in the room,</span>
  <span> and the Ivari had no desire to see either her or Jaegar demonstrate the knife-fighting tactics they were debating.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Shiloh was talking to the two fighter unit officers,  the famously wild-hearted Jake Anders and Callie Dala, and inquiring as to their views on the joint operation they were likely to be sent on. The “heavy” unit commanders, Captain Shen of the Rhino Tank company and Major Vasiliev, in command of the Ursa Battalion, the field test group for the new heavy-weapons mounting power armor system, were collaborating on how much firepower could realistically be brought to an assault on the Vulpexi base that had been established on Draxis III, which was a famously tough nut to crack. The Vulpexi had paid for it with millions of Kilicks and tens of thousands of Tyrsians. Sclunter and Vulpexi losses were in the thousands after the attack. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Bremmis, the Ivari who’d called the meeting as an effort to get to know the human leadership, at least those who’d been testing the cutting edge of human innovation, was getting a better picture of the way this strange worked, and the niche they’d carved for themselves in the Federation society. The Dembra were unrivalled as engineers, builders of ships and structures, but while their warriors were brave, they were not mobile and in a battle of attrition, the Tyrsians had the edge by virtue of being only slightly weaker…but much, much faster. They were capable of holding lines easily, but in battles of maneuver or on assaults, humans reigned supreme. The Dembra had come to acknowledge this, pride notwithstanding, and maintained most defenses, as well as sharing their asteroid mining and building techniques with other races. The Epomi had revolutionized the food production of Earth and the other Federation races, as well as teaching the strange, backward humans how to better utilize solar energy. The Nathians had been able to rehabilitate refugees from everywhere, (the Epomi were still too nervous to work well with human soldiers, many of whom were unabashedly carnivorous and that…was a nonstarter). and the Ivari…they’d brought these races together, had facilitated communications among all of them, had been the only group with a language that was learnable by all of them</span>
  <span> (Humans and Nathians had learned each other’s speech to a degree, but their languages required a thicker tongue than the Epomi had, and the Epomi language required more tongues than either of them had. As to the Dembra language…it wasn’t learnable by those who had only two jaws.) The Ivari had mapped the stars, and were still the primary transporter of supplies between Federation states.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey, Adisa?” Jake called out, “You get any intel on the new Vulpexi Admiral? The one who caused all that trouble on Dacas? I know you’re closer with Intel than the rest of us and I’d kinda like a shot at frying the fucker.” Adisa’s laugh was lyrical, and her answer was a slight shake of the head. “Damn. Thanks anyway. By the way, is it true Viper Team uses venom from earth species on their melee weapons to add an extra punch?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Adisa nodded. “Yes, it is. Turns out sea wasp and asp venom, mixed, is something even Tyrsians can’t take more than a tiny bit of before they start going down.” Jaegar laughed, “Really? Damn. Gonna have to try that at some point. Oh, and…have the rest of you heard the rumor that we’re supposed to get a nice, safe rotation back Earthside for publicity’s sake?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The series of outraged curses from throughout the room had the Ivari duck behind the bulkhead. When humans said those words, they tended to start shooting not long after. Perhaps they’d seen something through the porthole and thought that their chances of going home for a peaceable time among their species were being reduced by an attack? “Goddamn. They’ll want us to give speeches. Have I mentioned I hate public speaking?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake grinned when Callie mentioned off-hand that she wouldn’t mind it if they got to see the family, but that wouldn’t be on Earth. Shen looked at Callie after she’d said that and asked, with trepidation, “Family? Pardon, Lieutenant, but I was given to understand that you and Ensign Anders were the only members of your families to survive the crash of the first Horizons vessel?” Jake nodded. “Nathian family. Children of two species, cross-race adoption, all that good stuff. I’ve missed Namna.” Callie grinned, “Yeah. Heard that she enlisted with the Refugee Protection corps.” Jake laughed, “Aww, fuck, why didn’t you tell me?” he muttered darkly when she’d mentioned she’d assumed he’d heard. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jaegar more or less ignored the discussion and looked at Shen, “Hey, I know you don’t know them that well, and you’re still fairly new to the club, but ah, they’re a bit sensitive about that. There’s a lot of the time they don’t really feel like they fit in back on earth anymore so…” Shen nodded. “Fair enough.” Adisa and Shiloh were discussing their own plans for Earthside rotation, and Vasiliev got to sipping the liquor on the side, trying to calm his nerves about speaking to the crowds of earth.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Ivari was still trying to process what it had just heard. Time in front of cameras and being asked to “look pretty” was frightening to the humans. Humans who preformed maneuvers in space that the Ivari, cartographers of the galaxy, would not dare. Who built ships with slapdash construction methods and attempted feats with them that Dembra craft would be hard-pressed to achieve. Who challenged the Vulpexi. Who he’d seen fight Tyrsians and chittering swarms of Kilicks without flinching or even hesitating. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Chalk it up, he thought, and simply add one more to the list of ways in which humans are completely and utterly batshit – he used the human word here, unsure how else to describe the humans but in their own tongue – insane.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0014"><h2>14. Aid Delivery</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Callie and Jake flew into the Tembras system, where a column of ships carrying refugees to a secure system was about to be launched. The hellish few months spent back on earth, giving speeches, talking about how they were still committed to supporting the alliance and showing the Vulpexi what humans could do, was finally over. The vapid media had kept asking about the two of them and their personal lives, but they’d been able to ignore most of those questions; if the media wanted to tell some stupid human interest story about the children of two worlds or them falling for each other, fine, but they wouldn’t help.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Their current mission was an easy one. Get into space and rendezvous with a refugee convoy they Nathians had organized and the rest of the Squadron. The space between stars was still as vast and beautiful as ever. Callie decided to ring her Ensign a bit. “Hey, Jake? Remember when we were kids, couldn’t wait to be out here?” There was a silence on the other end. “Yeah. I do. Now we are, and it’s not really what we expected it to be, is it?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Callie sighed, and Jake could tell she was reflecting on the bittersweet nature of life. “No. But still. We get to cruise the stars, see interesting new peoples, teach the galaxy about humanity, learn about the other species…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Occasionally kill them?”</span>
  <span> Jake’s voice had taken on a slight edge of black humor. “Eh, I shouldn’t complain as much as I do. We got to stick together, got to explore. Once the war is over, I’d be willing to bet they use Tiger Squadron to keep on exploring.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You going to re-enlist? Can’t say I’m surprised. Do want to take a vacation after the war’s done, get some time in with the family.” Jake’s laugh on the other end echoed briefly through the cockpit. “God, that sounds nice. So, hear who’s the CO of the refugee ship? It’s Namna.” Callie started laughing. “And you didn’t tell me because…I didn’t tell you she’d enlisted.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I wouldn’t dare withhold such information from you, Lieutenant. I just honestly totally forgot. Think we’ll get some time to chat with her when we get there?” The nav computers beeped, and Callie laughed. “Let’s go find out.” FTL drives engaged and what was perceived as only a few moments later, they arrived at their destination, spotting the colorful Nathian ships on scanners, just leaving the Tembras system. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey guys, we’re back. Tony, how’d the squadron manage for you?” The response was positive, and the two officers swept into formation with the convoy. Jake rang the civilian ship while Callie gave the briefing. “Tiger Squadron, our objective is to ensure that these refugees and supplies safely reach Antares, not a single ship is to be lost.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Namna answered the hail of the fighter escort officer and saw her long-lost adoptive brother. “Jake? It’s so good to see you again. Your squadron mates have told me so much…” Jake laughed. “So, Namna, you decided to enlist. Why?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, I remembered how you two saved me from the Ramor, and saved the colony from the first battle of the war, and you did it because the Nathians were there to save you. And you were there to save us. I want to be there to save more people, so they can save others, and hopefully, it’ll just keep going.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Callie cut into the conversation, “That’s…beautiful, Namna. I’ve forgotten how good a heart you always had.” Jake knew that tone. Callie was feeling a strange mix of guilt and pride. Namna was too busy squeeing about hearing from her sister again to notice. “So, you’re the ones protecting us on the way out? We’ve got a few of every species kids aboard. Wolf Regiment took down a huge slave processing facility in the area and extracted the captives, dropped them off on the Dembra colony, but the Dembra are about to come under siege so we figured it would be better to evacuate them somewhere safe. The Ivari ships are carrying refugees, food and medicine Antares, which was only recently declared fully secure.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“10-4, Namna. We’ll be watching out for you guys. Once the mission is completed, I’d like to catch up a bit, family reunion. Small one, but what can you do?” Namna chittered, happily, “I’d like that, we’ll catch up on Antares while the ships are in maintenance.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Callie smiled, then said, “Sounds good, we’ll introduce you to the squadron as well, get acquainted with the others you’re working with. Kick into hyperspace and we’ll be good in no time.” The drives engaged again, flying through the endless void until they dropped out a few parsecs from their destination.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’ll be…oh fuck.” Her sensors screamed as Vulpexi hyperspace exit signatures were detected nearby. “We’ve been interdicted, all refugee craft, get your shields up. Squadron, protect the convoy at all costs, and drive off the raid.” She activated her weapon systems as Jake cut across the squadron frequency, “TIGER SQUADRON, FANGS OUT!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The squadron wheeled against the Vulpexi fighter unit and attempted to gain the upper hand. They had lancer missiles, ones that could punch through shielding, now, but the utility was limited by point defense of most of the enemy’s larger ships. “Tony, take a wing left and eliminate that trio trying to get at the med supplies, my wing, pull forward and break their wedge, Jake…” A surge of energy washed over her shields from the homing missile that Jake had just burned out, “Watch my ass, or better yet, find and utterly destroy the long range missile frigate.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Copy that.” Callie watched Jake’s saber streak off with two others flanking it while she engaged the main body of the fighters, with only a trio of enemy fighters chasing her partner. The enemy were surrounding from above and several other angles…like… “Hm…can a flikker</span>
  <span> maneuver be done in a zero-g/resistance environment? No time like this to find out…” Blasting her thrusters unevenly she rotated her Saber 45 degrees up and violently to the left, firing a quick burst while dialing down the inertial dampening on the gauss guns to induce actual recoil, and smiled grimly as the Vulpexi fighter she’d aimed at flew apart as her own ship was shoved backward, spiraling tightly and getting her an angle on another fighter, which she blasted before surging the thrusters and corkscrewing around to eliminate a third and fourth. “Goddamn, that worked. Add that to the playbook. Tony, how’re you doing eliminating the breakthrough wing?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Targets eliminated, there was a boarding vessel but it turns out the Sclunter can’t breathe vacuum any better than the slugs.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Copy, excellent.” A few plasma bolts streaked past her and she wheeled sharply to engage them. “Alright, let’s see what you’ve got.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake was having his own problems. His two wingmates were following him and had eliminated all but one of the tailing enemy fighters, and he’d had to order them to split off to deal with a secondary boarding craft, and several missiles already launched against the refugee ship. “I’ll handle the last fighter, just protect the refugees. I’ll return to the convoy once I’ve eliminated the Frigate. Go.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“10-4 Ensign, good luck.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake sighed as a small cloud of homing missiles streaked past him from the front. “Oh fuck am I gonna need it…” He accelerated as the enemy fighter continued it’s pursuit. Every time he thought he had a great idea of how to torch the missiles, the fighter interfered. Every time he thought he had a line on the fighter, the missiles forced him back to evasion. “Goddamn, Callie always was the better dogfighter, dodging big guns was more my…” He grinned, evilly. “Okay, now THAT is an evil idea.” He streaked towards the frigate, evading the enemy guns desperately, and then right before he hit the shielded bubble, he cranked almost 90 degrees vertically and blasted the thrusters just as the missiles were about to hit, elevating the rear directional shields to maximum and trusting his skill as a pilot to avoid the ships point defense. The missiles burst against the enemy shield and the blast wash combined with his own thrust allowed him to gain a massive distance from the frigate. The enemy fighter also managed to pull up away from the shields just as Jake began streaking back towards the enemy, guns blazing. The last Vulpexi fighter dodged inside its own shields and fell instant victim to the EMP holding, followed by automated point defense. Jake fired all his lancers, and the antimatter torpedo, and laughed madly as the point defense overloaded on less important targets like its own fighter and his lancers and missed the torp.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Callie, Frigate eliminated. Heading back to the convoy. You guys clear?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, Jake. Last of the enemy squadron pulled back or got vaped, no civilian casualties. No casualties of the squadron either. This was a perfect engagement.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hot damn!” he cut over to the civilian circuit. “Convoy, this is Tiger Squadron, the raid’s been driven off. No casualties. Everyone alright?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Affirmative, Tiger Squadron. Thanks for the help.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Callie breathed a sigh of relief as they re-entered hyperspace and began an orbit of Andares II, slowly entering the atmosphere.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Once they dismounted and the refugees were safely processed and the unit had some time, the Squadron assembled, as did the Aid Corps Unit. Callie did the introductions. “Squadron, this is Namna, a Commander of the Aid Corps, and the adopted sister of both Ensign Anders and myself. Namna, this is Tiger Squadron. The big guy with the scar across his cheek? That’s Tony, he’s the guy who ran the mission while Jake and I were on Earth.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Namna held out a paw and gripped the hands of each human, expressing gratitude to them for caring for her brother and sister. “Eh, it’s just what humans do. The Ensign and the LT are both damn good officers, so it’s not like it’s a bad gig. What about your crew?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Namna introduced her people, some few dozen Nathians, and gave her brother and sister a quick hug. “Don’t wait so long to get in contact. The Aid Corps will request Tiger Squadron as an escort whenever we can.” Callie and Jake hugged the diminutive space otter tightly, then mounted back up. “Hey Namna? Stay out of trouble, okay?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Nathian gave a quick bark of amusement. “Alright. Just make sure you keep getting out of it.” She waved as the Sabers took flight again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Some hours later, Namna was worried. Jake and Callie seemed as wild and reckless as ever, and they’d certainly saved the convoy. But they’d carried themselves differently this time. Like predators more than the playmates she’d known. They had always been tough, and they were certainly still loving. Maybe it was just something that happened as humans grew older. She hoped that was it. Her AAR credited Tiger Squadron with the Convoy’s survival, and asked that the next time such a run was to be made, the unit led by her family would be dispatched for the mission. She trusted no one more.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0015"><h2>15. Heavies</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>How much Dakka is too much? There is only one answer and you already know it</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>The battle for Draxis was about to begin. The Rhino tanks, the Fourth Infantry Corps, the Ursa shock unit and the Second Armored Corps were about to engage. The naval stage was led by Sixth Fleet. The Vulpexi navy had only a token force to protect the planet, and Ivari intelligence had revealed the reason why. Having harvested the bulk of the ore and resources they could from the planet, the enemy had simply allowed Killick hives to grow all over the rocky world, and it was likely that they were looking at an infestation in the tens of billions. The shipyards had been destroyed prior to the retreat so the enemy couldn’t use them, and the fuel source harvested from this world was incompatible with Vulpexi drives. It was effectively little more than a mining colony to the enemy, but vital production ground for the Federation.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Vulpexi navy launched a few warheads and attempted to leap back into hyperspace upon seeing those deflected. The interdiction nets projected by the Sixth Fleet caused them to fail, and they were quickly destroyed, inflicting limited casualties on the unit taking the planet back. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The naval force was gone, leaving the Kilicks on the planet to fend for themselves. Sixth fleet could have simply burned the enemy force out with Novapulse weaponry, but at the cost of massive damage to the planet and the doom of any of the human, Epomi and Dembra remaining on the world as slave labor. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Kilicks, therefore, would be driven out. The Ursa Shock unit, the specialized “Heavy weapons” unit who carried megawatt lasers, and ESPS grenade launchers would drop first, followed by Fourth Infantry Corps. The Rhino tanks and Second Armored Division would follow that. The goal would be to sterilize the surface of the drop zone and draw the Kilicks from all over the single continent on the planet towards the position, after which the infantry would begin entering the nests with the flamethrowers and burning out the eggs. A single unit of Tyrsian shocktroops had been left behind, much like the skeleton naval force, it was likely composed of troops who had proven inadequate for the satisfaction of the Vulpexi or Tyrsian warmaster. Those were what the tanks were for.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Express elevator to hell, going down.” The marines of Fourth Corps and the Ursa Shock Battalion piled into the drop pods and plummeted towards the alien landscape below. On impact, Major Vasiliev swept the surrounding area, the orange skies and strange rock formations. Kilicks boiling up out of the ground were answered quickly. “Megawatt lasers, keep them back. Bravo company, use the launchers and see what you can do about the horde coming from the Northwest.” The massive lasers cutting through the tides of insectile monsters swarming towards them certainly made an impression, the beams of coherent light sliced through the onslaught like a hot knife through warm butter. The Kilicks kept coming but they were losing, on average, a thousand troops or more a second.</span>
</p><p>
  <span> Impressive as the lasers were, they didn’t hold a candle to the Electrostatic Pulse Shrapnel grenades. Each was loaded with sixteen submunitions designed to explode and trigger an electrostatic propellant, accelerating over seven hundred small ball bearings to a velocity that would cause them to strip atoms they passed of electrons, resulting in the nickname “lightning bomb.” Bravo company fired their payload in the direction of the millions strong swarm some sixteen kilometers away…and watched on their sensors as the man portable artillery swept two thirds of the swarm away in a wash of electric blue fire. A second volley. A third. Megawatt lasers still belching coherent light into the enemy ranks and scything through them with horrifying efficiency. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Fourth Corps arrival made it a party as the marines began entering killick nests and burning out the eggs with flamers. Brutal, yes, but it kept the problem from coming back. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Major Vasiliev allowed himself a moment of satisfaction as he looked out over the battlefield. He began transmitting what he saw. As far as the eye could see, little to no visible ground. Kilicks, dead ones, piled three deep over every inch in every direction to the limit of human sight. “Hot damn. Where are the tanks? I wouldn’t want them to miss this.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Captain Shen of the Rhino Tank company was having a field day. The Rhinos were massive, on par with a pre FTL apartment complex, the main cannons firing three meter wide, six meter long shells that could knock starships out of orbit. For area denial, they used a much, much larger version of the same weapon as the launchers the Ursa Battalion favored.  It was that, sixty rounds of it, fired into the Tyrsian fortress. Shen took a moment to allow himself to imagine how those reptilian brutes had experienced it. About enough time to say “Incoming” before the world turned to lightning and the entire army disintegrated around you. The Kilicks were swarming and their own main guns couldn’t fire that close, so they switched to the gigawatt lasers that had been mounted to the chassis as the weapon for crowd control. Which really told Shen everything to know about the beautiful maniacs who’d designed these things. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>After nearly six days of a battle the Kilicks simply couldn’t win, (though they’d taken some eight hundred standard tanks and some 12,000 Marines with them) Draxis was secured. Over 12 billion Kilicks had fallen and it had never been even close to a fair fight.  The AAR tended towards the belief that the sheer firepower of the units involved made them ideal for assaults and went so far as to suggest that the enemy had nothing on the ground that could come even close to competing with this.</span>
  
</p><p>
  <span>Draxis was secured, and the human ground game was back on. Fourth Corps began setting up bases in the area and soon the Dembra warriors reclaimed responsibility for holding the planet. Ursa Battalion and Rhino company, as well as the human regular units, had tasks elsewhere. Rumor was that shortly, they were going to be part of a heavy counteroffensive strike into Vulpexi space to take a world the Vulpexi had believed secure for a long time. It was time that the slugs</span>
  <span> began understanding what it was like to have a war follow you home.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0016"><h2>16. Breaking Siege</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>“Lt. Callie Dala.” Callie snapped to in front of the High Commander.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Commander Shiloh Hendrix.” The older woman snapped a sharp salute as well.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>High Commander Gonzalez began speaking. “Fifth, Fourth, and Second armadas are all engaged in heavily disputed space. Since the retaking of Draxis, the Vulpexi have pulled their Tyrsian armies back from the front, leaving the more expendable Kilicks to be wiped out by our ground forces. They are preparing for a heavy counteroffensive that will most likely initiate within a cycle. First and Third Armada have been dispatched to attempt to break up several Vulpexi fleets gathering to support the push, but Tenebras, where the Dembra are building Sixth Armada and putting their engineering capability to work on alterations to armor and weapons for our forces, was left under-defended and now the Vulpexi have laid siege with a token force. According to the Ivari, the siege was never intended to actually destroy Tenebras, merely to keep it pinned until the bulk of the enemy forces could arrive. Regular drops of Killick hives have done little more than irritate the garrisoning Fifth Corps, but they are keeping those troops from being deployed anywhere else.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Your task is to proceed break the siege and drive the Vulpexi ships out of orbit. Once you’ve done that, land on the planet. You may be interested in some of the upgrades the Dembra and Ivari shipwrights say they’ve created for you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes Ma’am!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Callie walked out of the briefing room, Jake, her childhood friend turned lover turned second in command, fell in behind her, naturally. “We’re breaking the siege at Tenebras, Jake. Tell the squadron I want them ready for takeoff in 45 minutes or less. Commander Hendrix has a competitive streak and if our squadron is not ready to warp when she is I’m going to have all of them doing inertia tests for a week.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake gave a wicked smile. “Already prepped. Just have to punch in the navicomputer details.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She glanced at him. “I knew there was a reason I liked working with you.” They gave each other’s hands a quick squeeze before rushing back into the hanger. “Alright, we’re going to Tenebras, apparently the locals have some cool upgrades and they can’t give them to us with all those damn Vulpexi in the way. So let’s fry some slugs, shall we? Get ready to get out, we’ve got two jumps to make.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Once they were in the cockpits, Callie heard herself give the orders to prep for takeoff, start priming FTL drives. Once the hangar bay opened they began exiting. Shiloh Hendrix had taken a shuttle to her flagship, the Nemean, and was now preparing to jump.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Once they began soaring through hyperspace, the chatter was low-grade across the squadron channel. No worries, easy mission, break a Vulpexi encirclement with the backup of Lion Fleet, drive them off. Easy enough. Once they dropped out of the first hyperspace jump and calculated their leap to the second beacon, which was going to take a bit longer due to using an inferior FTL module that was mandated by enemy forces in the destination, they began priming weapons. Once they began pushing forward, the chatter slowed down, replaced by Callie giving the briefing. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don’t take huge risks, don’t get decisively bogged down in any one fight, our job here is to eliminate their fighters and support against corvettes. Shock and speed, that’s how we do things in Tiger Squadron, just keep moving and cutting them down as fast as you can. Killing them means humans and our allies surviving, so be merciless.” That was greeted by a round of grim chuckles, but they were edged with the truth of the words. Lion Fleet had been shuttled from battle to battle to lift sieges or be the cavalry at critical points, but Tiger Squadron’s primary duty of late had been to drive off raids, escort refugees, and provide cover for Wolf Regiment, especially the cross-ship marines who boarded Vulpexi prisoner vessels. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Mercy was not really a concern anymore.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The music over the main channel was now pumping, they were less than three minutes out. </span>
</p><p>
  <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukDEYRXoH2g">
    <span>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukDEYRXoH2g</span>
  </a>
</p><p>
  <span>Upon entry, the signature call came, just as Lion fleet dropped out of orbit, guns blazing away at the battleships. “TIGER SQUADRON, FANGS OUT!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The sabers wheeled and engaged heavily. Lancer missiles, antimatter torpedoes, and gauss guns played against gamma pulse guns, plasma cannons, and swarm rockets in eliminating the Vulpexi fighters. Jake began laughing partway through. Callie recognized it, she’d heard it whenever he helped fight Ramor beasts with the Nathians, a mad, adrenaline-fueled laugh of a human doing something stupid in defense of what they loved. “Jake, fall in to my left wing, I’m going to punch a hole on that corvette’s fighter escort, your job is to eliminate the ship. Tony, take a second wing and push back the third wing.” They swept around, weapons blazing. Tony watched for a moment, helping eliminate the Vulpexi fighters now approaching.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Shiloh Hendrix watched the striped Sabers engage and rip apart the enemy fighters. Her own forces began blasting away at the Vulpexi’s heavier ships, focusing four destroyers and two frigates to eliminate a dreadnaught, missiles and guns hammering it until it finally broke apart. Her flagship, the Nemean, was ripping through two battleships, and had shattered a few destroyers. Her own battleships began attacking the enemy corvettes, and she smiled coldly as Tiger Squadron ripped through two more corvettes. “Yes. Alright, battleships, I want that center line broken, I’ll support you. Destroyers, keep shredding the enemy support craft, Frigates, try to keep the swarm rocket barrages going, I don’t want any boarders.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Vulpexi fleet commander in charge was decent, but it freely admitted, it had no idea at all how to react to the human assault. When a human voice came across the comms, laughing madly, it realized it was going to die. If these strange, hairless apes could rip through his whole force with, thus far, only two corvettes and four fighters lost, he was clearly going to die. “All units, fall back…” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He knew the escape craft from his dreadnaught would be found soon, and quickly saw the fighters streaking towards them. “I surrend…” the world flashed to fire when a missile impacted.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Alright, I think we got the enemy captain, Commander. How’re the remaining enemy capital ships doing?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Being mopped up fast, they’re starting to retreat. You did well.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don’t we always. Let’s set down and see what they can do in the way of repairs and upgrades.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Dembra and Ivari shipwrights had some shit to show them. Among them, a modified shielding system and power loadout that would allow Tiger Squadron to once again get inside enemy shields without their drives getting scrambled. They still had to contend with enemy point defense, but they could now resume dancing with disaster to engage enemy heavy craft. That, plus superior maneuverability and acceleration. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>For Lion Fleet, they had something even better. They had massive armor and engine upgrades, plus a whole new shielding system that would effectively melt anything attempting to board. Heavy plasma weaponry could also be added. The changes would be complete in a matter of weeks. “So, in a few weeks, we’ll be back in the fight. And once that’s happened, we’ll be fighting the enemy on the terms we used to. They’ll never have a chance.”</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0017"><h2>17. Striking Snake</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Human spec ops. Unfortunately, on the wrong target.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Matras was quivering with excitement. The Vulpexi Admiral knew what was coming. It was expected that he was going to be taken under the wing of the current Grand Admiral, and likely elevated to that role. The current one had already stated that someone who had a successful record in clashes with the humans would soon take up his mantle. The defeats at some of the disputed worlds stung horribly, yes, but soon the full force of the Vulpexi navy would be assembled and he could initiate his counterattack.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Tyrsian guards saluted him as he slithered between them, his personal ground commander, Tiochnx, falling in behind him. “After today, you will be the first of your kind since annexation to be given the title of Chieftain-General. You are my favored arm on the ground, and I have little patience left for Vulpexi commanders who don’t know how to match the humans in surface warfare attempting to override you. After today, they won’t be able to.” The Tyrisian’s skins rippled and it growled, “Thank you, my Lord.” They approached the room where the Tribunal was waiting.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>*******</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Adisa and Viper team were racing through the Vulpexi capitol on their homeworld. The orders were to eliminate the Grand Admiral and any other target they could. She’d dropped out of the belly of an Ivari stealth ship, and she and her team had quietly crept around buildings. They flashed quiet hand signals to each other. Wait, give cover, advance. They came upon a handful of Tyrsian guards in more ceremonial armor, and with a light coil pistol, she and her forces quickly silenced them. Ducking between massive buildings and going completely motionless as a larger patrol passed by the area, they activated the camouflage units and hoped desperately that the stealth technology involved did in fact hold out. When they weren’t discovered, the squad continued to move around, quickly eliminating anything that saw them, but making their way to the Vulpexi Tribunal audience hall. They had one hour to complete the task and return to the pickup zone where the alleged “trader” ship was docking. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She detached herself from the shadow of the wall, approaching the guards at the door. She quickly put five rounds in the chest and three in the head, then slithered across the back of the other one, opening its throat to the bone with a vibroknife. Signaling the rest of her squad forward, they entered the building.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Matras compressed his body and waited while they read out the titles. “In the name of the Vulpexi Empire, in light of your record of defeating the mad, defiant race known as humans, you are named Grand Admiral, with the right to name any ground commanders, any fleet commanders, any subordinate to any position that you choose, for the duration of hostilities. You will be mentored in many of the finer points of the Great Armada’s unique systems by your predecessor, who should be arriving shortly…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>**** </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The squad took a few back hallways, and found the office they were told belonged to the current Grand Admiral of the Vulpexi. They opened the door with a magnetic pick and quickly, brutally disposed of it before it could cry out, using white phosphorus laced flachettes, before racing back away, executing two more officials they happened to stumble across on the way out. Among them, the “Speaker to Savages” who’d offered the insulting and hateful terms of surrender to them at the last diplomatic summit humanity had had with the empire...meanwhile, the guards they’d slaughtered at the exit had been discovered…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>*** </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Matras nodded. “Thank you for this great honor, O Tribunal…” Alarms started squawking.  “All units, find and utterly destroy whatever damnable human infiltrators have dared attack our homeworld.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The tribunal looked askance at him. “Grand Admiral, we understand you’ve been at war with them a long time and that humans are dangerous, hateful and unpredictable, with no respect for propriety but surely they aren’t on our homeworld…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You don’t know them. And alarms don’t get sounded by the guards for nothing. They’d absolutely try this. Everyone, make your exit.” He took a moments’ pleasure from the fact that he could order around the Tribunal now, then continued, “We are all, everyone in this room, what they would refer to as “high-value targets.” If they can kill any of us to cause chaos to our people, they will.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The outcry that greeted that statement was incredible. How dare these miserable, hairless apes come to the homeworld as anything but slaves?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Adisa and her forces quickly gunned down the enemy forces between them and the exit and began running. 30 minutes to retreat. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Railgun rounds flashed after them, they evaded while activating the camoflague units. “Captain Ilian, the mission is complete, request immediate takeoff on arrival, shit hit the fan HARD, over.” The Ivari at the other end cursed. Humans never seemed to be able to do anything neatly but damn were they excellent at what they did. “Understood, Sgt. Adisa. We’ll prepare for takeoff. Try not to lead too many of them to our position if you could avoid it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“10-4.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The sprint was fast. Around alleys, up and over low-slung buildings, side streets…slashing the vibroknife across two scaly throats in one swipe because they were in her way and her men needed to get the hell out of here, damnit. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Mowing down a trio of patrolling Tyrsians as she ran towards the trading ship, her forces sprinted after her, providing interference fire of their own. Almost there….</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Matras and his newly appointed chieftain general watched them. Doubtless the humans were going to try to make for that Ivari trade vessel, and from there they would escape. That wasn’t acceptable after they’d slaughtered the Empire’s chief diplomat and his predecessor. The Tyrsian guards adjusted their aim</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Ivari trade ship exploded in front of them and Adisa cursed, swearing as a piece of molten titanium struck one of her subordinates in the leg. She ordered her men forward, humans had always kept a backup pilot trained on stolen enemy craft for moments like this, a thought that had horrified Dembra, Ivari, Nathian and Epomi alike when they’d been told. She was at the wounded man now. “Sarge, what are you doing, the mission’s FUBAR just get out…” She slung him over her shoulder and kept running as the other commandos took a Vulpexi trade ship and the pilot flung himself into the cockpit and began taking off, firing the guns at the enemy formations on the ground. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Matras watched their escape. The one, the dark-skinned woman who’d led the raid, had seized a wounded comrade and still made it to their stolen escape craft. Human loyalty at play, and after extracting information from a prisoner of war, he’d heard tell how human mothers could lift vehicles off their spawn thanks to a hormone called “adrenaline.” He idly wondered if this was the same one involved in what she’d just pulled off. Filing the thought away, he raged quietly that they’d managed to steal one of his ships and been able to actually fly it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When asked if he wanted to fire on it or have the fleet give chase, he shook his head. “No. We know where their homeworld is, our Speaker gave the co-ordinates to us before he died. I want the fleet heavily loaded, and I want to see how they react to us striking the world that gave this wretched species its birth. They strike at our homeworld? We’ll attack theirs and show them what it means to defy the Dominion.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Adisa laughed madly as the medic took a look at Thompson’s wound. “He’ll live. Hell, with Nathian and Epomi biotech, he’ll make a full recovery.” The mission had been accomplished, and they’d barely gotten out, had doubtless rattled the entire Vulpexi empire in doing so. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Grand Admiral who’d been causing so much trouble was dead. The war would soon be over.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0018"><h2>18. Raid on Terra</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Grand Admiral Matras and his newly-appointed Chieftain-General of Tyrsian elite ground troops boarded the flagship. Vulpexi crew boarded first, then Sclunter expendable boarding units, a few stasis-held Kilick hives, and then the army of Tyrsians. The goal was to begin the counterstrike to drive those hated hairless apes out of the Disputed Zone. However, a secondary force, composed of a handful of Tyrsians whose blood wrath,</span>
  <span> as Tiochnx explained the condition, was beginning to come to far to the fore, was being assembled, alongside a unit of Vulpexi who’d been disgraced by attempting to surrender in previous engagements, sent to redeem themselves in one last great mission of honor. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Tyrsians would be dropped on a singular population center on earth, the Kilicks scattered, while the Vulpexi ships would begin a campaign of using gamma pulse bombs to sterilize wide stretches of the planet, having now come to the conclusion that Humans would never make good citizens of the Vulpexi empire.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Matras looked as those ships took off, he and Tiochnx raising arms in salute. With that, he and his new Chieftain-General began preparing the main force for an all-out assault on the human and Dembra fortifications on the outer worlds, as well as plans to draw out the damnable special units that the code-slicers in intelligence dubbed “Tiger Squadron” and “Wolf Regiment” to be destroyed. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>*****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The jumps were going well so far. No interdiction, merely the bare minimum time to let the drives cool and recharge between beacons before leaping to the next system set. The Forlorn Battlemaster, in command of the attack on earth, began issuing orders for the dispersion of his forces. The Tyrsian dropships would deposit some three thousand Tyrsian berserkers, the warriors of that race whose years of combat had driven them all but mad with bloodlust into a city called New York, while Killick hives would be dropped on a continent called “Australia”…the Forlorn paused for a moment, thinking. Hadn’t the code slicers mentioned once that humans had a habit of calling their own world “Space Australia?” He shrugged the thought off and continued, figuring that it was likely a bit of humor from a mad species born of a mad world whose logic no sane race could dissect. Other hives would be dropped upon a region called the Amazon, on cities called London and Beijing and Los Angeles, and each would come with a small unit of no ore than a few hundred Berserkers. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Meanwhile, those still in space would fire gamma pulse bombs at centers of population untouched by the invasion. A city on a set of islands, Tokyo. Cairo, Buenos Aires, Chicago…anywhere that would do damage.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>*****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The invasion was not going to plan. Within moments of firing the hives and Tyrsian dropships onto the blue and white, strangely tilted world of their enemy, things started going wrong. The Kilicks dropping onto Austrialia’s more uninhabited zone to begin gathering had their queen communicate with the Forlorn almost upon contact. “THERE’S OTHER THINGS LIKE US HERE!” The Kilicks on that continent were slowly pushed out of contact, reporting deadly ropelike animals who were venomous, beings like the Kilicks but smaller and non-sapient who were extremely venomous, a large population of strange marsupials whose kicks shattered carapaces, things that seemed to be logs until they tore limbs from bodies and left warriors bleeding to death, and towards the end the transmissions became garbled enough that the Forlorn was fairly sure he’d gotten reports of Kilicks being swarmed by large, flightless birds. It was almost a relief to hear gunfire and a human voice in a strange accent take the comm and taunt, “Yeah, your bugs don’t seem to do well against bugs livin’ down under. Though I almost felt bad for the cunts when the Emus showed up. And I suppose I ought to tell you…we deal with enough big spiders we’re already burning out the eggs.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The reports from the city Beijing weren’t any better. That killick queen reported millions of humans milling around and swarming Kilicks…her voice seemed vaguely offended that anywhere existed where her people COULD be outnumbered so badly, and suddenly cut off under heavy gunfire. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The bombers were doing a little bit better, dropping gamma bombs on a few human cities, eradicating the life within. Above Tokyo, however, a strange field absorbed the gamma pulse and fired a crackling beam of radiation that boiled the bomber pilots in their shells. A quick hail from the ground revealed the source, “After the experience we had with nuclear bombing pre-FTL, we figured out some fun counters to it.” The Forlorn was baffled. Humans had nuclear bombed their own prior to FTL? They had to be insane, and maddeningly, they had survived it. And even worse, they were surviving again. A flash of counter-orbital fire came from the surface and in moments, the Forlorn knew he was doomed. “We did all we could…” he got out, before his world flashed to fire.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Amazon raid was going atrociously. Some thirty berserkers had been devoured by swarms of tiny insects crawling over them and stripping them to the bone. Some fifty had been wholly devoured by hostile fish in the rivers. Scores more had been lost to the myriad species of poisonous snakes, and now, despite their mass and training, the remaining handful were being hunted. Each time one left the circle to go on patrol it was discovered later locked in rigor mortis, transfixed by long wooden shafts with tips covered in poison.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>*******</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Los Angeles raid had been all but destroyed, having arrived at a point the humans referred to as “Rush hour” the response to invaders was to simply grind them against the pavement until their sickly yellow blood had coated the road to release some of the pent up rage that arises inevitably from being stuck in Southern California traffic. The Kilicks were vicious but they fought in melee, rending opponents to pieces to be fed to larvae to grow the hive, and against speeding cars…even armored bugs couldn’t win. And every time one vehicle was torn open and its inhabitants about to be devoured, it would quickly be used to grind the Kilicks to fine paste between it and other vehicles while other humans departed their vehicles to pull the survivors out.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>*******</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Killick assault on London, having arrived at 4pm local time, was going well to a point. Few humans in the area to attack them, at least outside. Entry to human dwellings proved…considerably more difficult. Apparently the locals had a ritual of drinking a sacred beverage of leaves and hot water during this point of the day and intrusion on said ritual by those other than close friends or family resulted in lethal violence with cricket bats, clothing irons, knives, archaic weapons, firearms, or whatever was at hand. The insects were finally surrounded by soldiers who the young Killick queen asked for a last request. “What ritual did we interrupt that we were greeted so violently?” The soldier thought about it for a moment. “Afternoon tea. We didn’t take kindly when the Germans bombed us during it either. Ludwaffte pilots who survived being shot down were often killed upon landing if they intruded on a British family during teatime.” With that, the men raised their rifles.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Tyrsian leader of the joint force in New York was in his element, blood of his enemies anointing him. As per tradition of Berserkers, he went into battle without armor, slashing and tearing all that stood before him. The locals were certainly tenacious, but that only added to the glory of the thing. They threw things, they fired combustion weapons and downed his brothers, they rammed his people with screeching yellow vehicles, they bludgeoned them in melee even knowing it meant death simply because the Tyrsians were invaders and New York was NOT a welcoming place to things that had come uninvited.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The towers proved miserable, more than eighty warriors had been taken out by simply dropping large chunks of construction material from on high and letting gravity take care of the rest. Humans in them were brutal and seemed to revel in joining together to grapple with and force invaders out of higher floors, watching the brutal lizards be torn apart by the impact against pavement.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Still, he was now away from the towers, closer to the more sensibly constructed, low-built dwellings in which the poorer denizens lived.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Wrenching open another of the strange human dwellings he found himself staring at  a human family, two of which, the largest, picked up weapons and attacked him. He swatted them aside and began ripping into them, until he heard a bang and wheeled around. There was someone else there, of a slightly different pigment than the ones he was rendering and holding a primitive combustion weapon…whose barrels he was now staring down. Several new arrivals with similar appearances surrounded the crying whelps and raised weapons.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You came to the wrong neighborhood, you scaly motherfuckers.” The barrels flashed and the Berserkers’ last war cry was silenced.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A young mother, holding her crying children as the battle raged around them saw the shadow of a Tyrsian soldier in the front, and quickly hushed her son. The monster must have heard him, though because it charged in and…she didn’t remember exactly what she’d done. She just remembered that she and her boyfriend had remembered something about the Vulpexi ambassador’s terms of surrender, that required humans to give up their children. When they came to, they were both covered in purple Tyrsian blood and their own. Paramedics were seeing to them. “What…what happened? Is my son okay?” The para nodded. “Yeah, your kid is fine. The boyfriend too. Vulpexi launched a raid…didn’t go too well for them. We’ve got a lot of wounded but not many dead. Humans…we looked out for each other during the invasion. Their forces didn’t. We won.”</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0019"><h2>19. Counteroffensive</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Oooooh the collapse of the dominion is about to start</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>The tracer missiles streaked past Callie’s Saber, the proud scarlet and azure tiger stripes emblazoned across the wings. “Hot damn! Tony take your wing and breach their left probe, Jake, take out those two corvettes, then come back and back me up.” She fired her gauss guns and fired off a few more of her Lancer missiles against the Vulpexi missile frigate who’s shields Jake had downed. “Alicia, take your wing and deal with the upper claw of the formation, strike at their bellies.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The battle was heavily underway. Tiger Squadron had been dispatched to assist Fourth Armada. The enemy were doubtless about to land ground troops but with the Second Corps and the Rhino Tank company on the ground that was likely to be a mistake. Plus, the space units had their own problems at the moment. Lion Fleet was with First Armada and was heavily engaged and Second, Third and Fifth were all engaged in other locations. Sixth and Seventh had been split into divisions to go assist each.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Vulpexi fired like mad, unfortunately accurately. Dozens of common fighters and yes, even four of the striped Tiger Squadron Sabers were burned out of the sky. Jake’s fighter streaked into the shields taking advantage of the new shielding to continue maneuvering, dancing around hundreds of weapons all desperately trying to get a lock on him before he fired his light warheads, three of the six lancers, into the zone above the reactor of that corvette. He twirled away, zipping around as the reactor tore apart. He screamed in triumph as the flew away, Callie ripping apart half the squadron of Vulpexi fighters pursuing him, in one moment actually blowing apart one engine and sending that fighter spinning into another. “Hey LT, we broke through the encirclement, looks like Fourth Armada is rallying and shoving back hard, starting to grind their way towards the enemy main fleet.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Callie thought, then replied, “Excellent. Support them and attempt to use your warheads against as many of the enemy capitol ships as you can manage. I know it takes two or three of us working together but that’ll swing the battle.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake meanwhile had zipped past another enemy squadron and had expended his last three lancers on crippling a second corvette that had started moving into a human battleship’s blind spot, now rectified as the target was annihilated by the bigger guns. “Jake holy fuck quit doing that. You’re drawing to much heat…” there was that same manic chuckle from the other end. “I’ve got this, I promise…” Fucking right, you idiot. As she began using an effect she’d noted of lancer missiles against fighters, timed right, she cleared out the better part of two Vulpexi squadrons on her own, taking advantage of the chain reactions and her own maneuvering, plus their disorientation after the blasts to mow them down. It was a trick, like Jake’s dancing with the heavier guns, that they had tried and failed to teach the others in simulation again and again. Another one came up and she used her heavy warhead to rip it apart, firing it dead into their center and letting the blast tear them out of the way of Jake’s own heavy antimatter torpedo, which sundered one of the enemy’s destroyers. “Alright, think we got their attention? Jake, keep crippling their guns, everyone else, help get through their fighters. We’ve got shit to do.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***** </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Commander Shiloh Hendrix of Lion Fleet was using every trick she knew. Her corvettes flashed across enemy formations, firing their lancers and heavy weapons, using their shields where needed to halt attacks. Her frigates, destroyers, and battleships engaged as heavily as they could in support of First Armada. “Goddamn. There’s just so damn many of the bastards.” First Armada’s dreadnaught signaled for aid and she ordered an interception fire course to destroy the two battleships that had gained advantage against it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I cannot wait for the war with these fucking slugs to be over…” she muttered. “Shields active, prepare to fire heavy plasma cannon and coil guns! We’re breaking this assault one way or another. Missile frigates, keep breaking up those enemy formations. Destroyers, I want you sweeping under and cutting up their battleships. Corvettes I want those goddamn enemy missile units destroyed! Battleships, engage hard against the dreadnaught, I’ll provide fire support as you do so.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>High Commander Maria Gonzalez looked out as Third Armada engaged against the wheeling masses of Vulpexi ships coming towards her. She hailed the enemy flagship before the battle started and was pleasantly surprised when the enemy commander answered. “I am Star Marshall Maria Gonzalez of the Terran Republic. And you are?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The face on the other side wriggled the eyestalks. “I am Grand Admiral Matras of the Vulpexi Dominion. Your race’s defiance is coming to an end. The full force of the Vulpexi Star Navy is behind me, over seventeen million craft, and my armies are commanded by the first Tyrsian to earn the title of Chieftain-General in centuries. The fires of defiance you have been lighting all over the empire will be extinguished and you along with them…” At that point, all of the hundreds of guns in third armada fired, melting away hundreds of Vulpexi ships.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Still think so, slug?” The battle commenced in earnest.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>*****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Col. Hann Jaegar and Wolf Regiment were in support of Third Corps and slamming the Kilick and Tyrsian onslaught with everything they had. Flachette guns, the gauss rifles, the manpack megawatt lasers and the incinerator units were being brought into play. Tyrisan elite troops whose armor bore a strange insignia ripped through Third Corps’ position before eventually being repulsed, leaving hundreds of their own dead and thousands of human slain in their wake. Kilicks, as ever, were massacred, often accepting six or seven thousand casualties per human killed.</span>
  <span> A round from a Tyrsian coil gun blazed past Jaegar’s head, the sonic boom prevented from destroying his ears only by the helmet. “Motherfucker…” His weapon was firing heavily, blasting away at the onslaught, and he began taking more carefully aimed shots. Headshot. Headshot. Three to the chest. Headshot. That was better, the Tyrsians were the core of the Vulpexi ground army, the Kilicks were nothing but cannon fodder. Wolf regiment and Third corps began driving them back on the stony ground of Winaler III.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Captain Shen and the Rhino tank company were having a field day with the heavy artillery. They’d been deployed as a counter to the rumor that the Vulpexi landing their heavy armored vehicles. So far, after the depleted-uranium steel-shaft penetrator rounds ripped holes through the enemy armored vehicles. Six or seven of the fifty Rhino tanks had gone down but over three hundred Vulpexi “Grinder”</span>
  <span> tanks had been destroyed beyond repair. Second corps was holding its ground admirably and using artillery loads and the mounted gigawatt laser antipersonnel weapons the Tyrsian and Kilick forces were scythed through. “Damn. If it were only this easy all the time.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Major Vasiliev and the Ursa shock infantry battalion were making use of the heavy weapons. The artillery, the flachettes, the megawatt lasers….if he could just get a decent fucking drink everything would be golden. There had been some issues, to be sure, prior to them realizing how adept the Tyrsians were at climbing and how good they were in melee with those murderous scything swords…supposedly the damn things were of some strange alloy and the blades were only one macromolecule wide…and he’d lost some hundred men. Twelve percent casualties thus far…thirteen after the blasts from the coil guns but damnit, with the Fourth Corps with them they were driving these fucking hordes back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Watching the footage of the battles the Ivari Archon, Epomi Minister, Dembra Union Chief and Nathian Matriarch were shaken. Humans had ceased to become mere flesh and blood. In defiance of the Vulpexi, especially after the attack on earth and the offer to enslave humans instead of exterminating them, Humanity in reply had become machines, the avatars of death itself. The Epomi grew food for the lot of them and were happy to assist in clean energy, the Dembra…once proud warriors now bowed their mighty heads and acknowledged that for the purposes of war, they would sooner build ships and arms for humanity and let the mad deathworlders lead the way. The Ivari continued to provide navigation and run supplies to all the human troops, and the Nathians…the beings that had helped bring humans into the alliance more than any other…helped handle refugees. And more and more as human soldiers died and their children needed to be taken in, Nathians stepped up.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The human President merely watched the meeting. “The Vulpexi attack on our homeworld was unanticipated and seemed like it was solely motivated by the desire to terrorize. This attack is something else again, an all out attack with the obvious motivation to drive us from our worlds and wipe us out.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We will not have it. The Vulpexi have over extended themselves, according to our Ivari friends, and the Dembra and Epomi report an ability to outproduce the enemy’s slaves. Further, Nathians are making some headway in rehabilitating a few of the Vulpexi slave races we’ve been able to capture. The only task remaining is to whether the counteroffensive and do enough damage that the Vulpexi will be left with only the option of suing for peace.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Dembra Union chief spoke up. “With respect, Human President….they might not. The slugs are proud, they won’t admit defeat to beings they see as lesser.” The Epomi concurred, as did the Ivari. The human president turned around, smiling with an expression of no humor. “If the Vulpexi Dominion does not yield, we’ll scrub the disgusting things from the galaxy star by star and burn them all away. As we answered them when they said they’d enslave us.”</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0020"><h2>20. Girding</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Both sides get ready for the final throws</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Grand Admiral Matras watched as the full force of the Vulpexi wave crashed down upon the human defenses, sweeping aside soldiers, tanks, ships, by the thousands. The Humans were finally paying for their arrogance, their fifth and sixth armada utterly destroyed, their planetside Fourth and First as well. And yet…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And yet the units that continued to fight were doing damage beyond his reckoning. Humanity would be brought to heel at last but the cost was going to be catastrophic. He hadn’t thought to use the last trump cards of the Dominion against humans, as he’d hoped to save them for the rest of the Alliance but it seemed as though their best option would be to use them now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Send forward the Dominion Knights Squadron, the Acclimator Flagship, rouse the First Queen of the Kilicks, and Tiochnx, prepare a full twelve thousand of your best warriors and get them into the experimental power armor. Hold them in proper training for point three cycles before having them deploy. Humanity will finally be extinguished. All units are to fall back for now, let the humans think they’ve won. We’ll need to reorganize.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Star Marshal Maria Gonzalez was pleased with the progress of the counteroffensive. They’d weathered the worst of the Vulpexi onslaught, and now the enemy were in full retreat. She ordered pursuit before drawing her forces back to reorganize, the battles had proven a horrific butchers’ bill for both sides. The enemy had lost millions of fighters, and hundreds of thousands of ships, she didn’t even want to think of how many lives, but they were retreating with millions and billions more left untouched. Perhaps Vulpexi politicians had had enough of their current Grand Admiral or perhaps the enemy were reconsolidating just as she was. Ultimately, it would come down to resupply and reinforcement.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>-----</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A full cycle later, the Dominion Knight Squadron stood prepared, their custom-built fighters  and heavy piloting gear ready. The Tyrsian Elite, now dubbed the Dominion’s Fist, was prepared as well, their armor now containing artillery weapons mounted to the shoulders and far increasing Tyrsians’ already impressive brawn.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Kilick Mother, on the other hand…the less that was said about that creepy thing the better. Older than anything they’d seen, woken up to command her full people in war, with the promise that she would be allowed to sleep and the Kilicks allowed free of the Vulpexi dominion. Tiochnx hadn’t asked for independence, just equal partnership. Matras had granted that readily. The Tyrsians were inferior minds, inferior beings, but far superior soldiers and in military matters he’d sooner rely on them than he would many of the Vulpexi.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The second phase of the counterstroke would initiate soon.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>Namna was picking up the refugees as quickly as she could. The all-out war was now encroaching more and more on human colonies and she was determined to get them all away. The Ivari ships were happy to transport but it was the Nathians who often provided the medical care. She offered a wounded human child, one with the scars of shrapnel from Killick flachette guns on her arm, some antiseptic cream and fed her a bit, singing softly. The words were in Namna’s native tongue, but they were soothing, and with the local anesthetic kicking in the child went to sleep gently. Namna quickly tucked the kid in, giving her a hug. That one, Miranda…she’d woken up from nightmares every night and often crying for her parents. Her mother was a navigator in the Terran Navy, her father one of the Marines. Unfortunately, her mother’s ship had been taken apart by a Vulpexi surprise attack and her father’s battalion had been killed to the last holding off the Kilicks massive swarms so the kids and civilians could evacuate.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>All the same, Namna thought, she had something to be proud of. Humans had given their lives time and time again without a second thought to protect their families and even their friends of other species. A few thousand Nathians had gotten off-planet as well thanks to that battalion. Namna sighed as another child, this one a five year old boy, started screaming, and ran over, cuddling him for a moment before letting him drift off back to sleep. Nathians were a family, and they’d adopted humanity and been adopted in return. By Nathian tradition, the child of one was the child of all. These children had lost their blood families to war, and they were in Nathian care now, until they were taken to some safe family back in more secure regions. If none could be found – though at least one always was, humans had an incredible ability to find a way to make room for one more – Nathians would handle it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Kur’Tak of the Dembra Union looked with pride at the massive dreadnaught his clan had finished constructing. Over 300 metric tons, nine-meter thick heavy tungsten, titanium and mid-carbon steel armor minimum, hexagonal deflection electromagnetic shielding, over 9000 heavy coil guns, missile bays with capacity for over sixty thousand lancer missiles and 1000 heavy warheads.</span>
  <span> The Titan class dreadnaught was the first of its kind and it would be used as the personal flagship of Shiloh Hendrix of Lion Fleet. It had been built to her specs, and the Dembra union as a whole looked forward to watching the humans bring the war to a close with the tools they could build.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Millions of Dembra forged the metals that billions mined so that hundreds of thousands could build the ships. The pride of the Dembra Union was the industry and right now it was proving that it could build just about anything. The </span>
  <em>
    <span>TRS Nemean </span>
  </em>
  <span>was impressive but they’d churned out thousands upon thousands of Flamberge-class dreadnaughts, Claymore Battleships, longsword-class Frigates, Katana-class corvettes, and Gladius destroyers. The Scimitar frigates were another special project, made more for counter-fighter suppression than long-range missile support but they were being built as rapidly as all the others.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Further, the Rhino tanks and Ursa mechs were coming along quickly, as were the millions of suits of more standard power armor. If it was to be the Dembra’s role to step aside and allow humans to fight, then the humans would fight with the best gear the Dembra could build them.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>*****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tellaria the Epomi farm manager was loading tens of thousands of metric tons of nutrient rich food and batteries full of billions of kilojoules of energy filled by Epomi powerplants. The fleet would be fueled. The humans would be fed. The war would be brought to a close and the horror and slaughter of billions of sentient lives could finally end and life could resume. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But the Epomi were a peaceful people, and their job was to save lives. So they grew food and filled batteries.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***** </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Humans were swirling in action all over earth, and between the stars readying for war. The Teran Army and Navy were having a hard time training them quickly enough. The threat to enslave humanity’s children and its allies had outraged the entire species and resolved it to war. After an assault on the human homeworld that had been repulsed but destroyed two major cities, nothing would do but to destroy the Vulpexi empire utterly, star by star until there were none of the twisted slugs left.</span>
  <span> Pilots trained in dizzying maneuvers. Crew of ships trained in VR and physical simulation for days on end. Infantry and tanker units ran, drove, repaired, practiced marksmanship and team maneuver. The Human race had mobilized. Hairless apes or no, they had awakened from their lives on Terra, which mere generations before would have been electrifying enough, now woken to be the elite warrior class of the alliance that protected the rights of a galaxy.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Humanity was riding to war. And all of hell rode with it.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0021"><h2>21. A Meeting of Equals</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>The battle on the ground of the second to last major planetary hub required for the finish of the war was vicious. Taquus IV was a dry world, and hot, the alien sky burning orange above. Col. Jaegar, Wolf regiment and the combined Second and Fourth Corps stood against what seemed to by the entire Tyrsian army marshalled at twenty million and hundreds of thousands of Vulpexi tanks. Against that there were a mere sixteen million humans and twenty thousand standard tanks. That plus their 4200 elite and their fifty absolutely absurd armored vehicles of Rhino Armored Cavalry company, led by Captain Shen. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The armored vehicle fight initiated well, the Rhinos outflanking the enemy formation and showcasing their truly ridiculous firepower, while the more standard human Mace Tanks engaged fairly effective fire, taking heavy losses but inflicting far worse. The Tyrsian infantry meanwhile charged, firing their coil guns and shrapnel cannons into the ranks of Second and Fourth corps, who replied in kind with their gauss rifles and the entrenched megawatt lasers. Their artillery however was forced to support Captain Shen, who’d been encircled badly. The antipersonnel weapons on his tanks fired away to make up for it, scything through battalions of Tyrsian warriors at a time. Hann Jaegar ordered his first battalion to get into position to support Fourth Corps, while a single battalion was unlikely to make a great difference in normal circumstances the Wolf Regiment forces were able to inflict headshots almost as fast as normal troops could spray and pray and with Tyrsian armor and pain tolerance being what it was that could turn a battle just by having far more kills between reloads.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Captain Shen had, with the artillery support of second and fourth Corps, broken through the encirclement and was now firing on what remained of the enemy armored corps as the artillery focused on enemy infantry now. The Second and Fourth were doing well enough in their own right and it was time to give them a bit of support. His unit had taken fifty percent casualties but those who remained were furious and ready to finish the fight. “Trio Alpha, fire at the six enemy vehicles to your left.” The second and fourth’s armored divisions had been wiped out completely but had done one hell of a number on the enemy tanks, many of which were now inoperable ruins. “Trio Bravo, eliminate the unit attempting to flank us. Trio Charlie, crack that center line.” He refocused and realized the situation. “Trio Delta, use the antipersonnel loads and destroy the Tyrsian eastern wing.” 12 of his remaining twenty-four super weapons were now in play. “Trio Echo, fire over Delta’s targets at 43 degrees additional elevation and sixteen degrees west to eliminate the twelve attempting a wide sweep.” “Foxtrot, Golf, take your units and attempt to flank their surviving company.” They moved to obey as the other guns thrummed, megawatt lasers blazing happily away against the swarms of Tyrsians attempting to assault his mobile fortresses. “Hotel, twenty eight degrees elevation, 67 degrees north, neutralize those tanks.” His own Rhino was now smashing through the last of the Dominion armor, while Delta’s fire flashed electric blue as over sixteen thousand Tyrsians ceased to exist.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Chieftain General Tiochnx was in his element, commanding his brethren and even some Vulpexi in their vehicles as the battle raged. Two of the human special units were here, Wolf Regiment and Rhino Armored Cavalry.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Today humans would witness the death of a legend. He’d been pleased by the initial charge, which had done well, slashing through human lines and inflicting heavy losses, albeit taking more than he would have preferred. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The humans more standard armored vehicles being destroyed only improved his mood, and seeing the Rhino unit, now down to half its former strength being surrounded had certainly been glorious, but that gave way when they and some enemy artillery began destroying the last of his tanks and laying waste to his center line, emboldening the enemy’s infantry to concentrate fire and begin turning the battle around. Seventeen kilometers to the nearest Rhino unit according to censors. It was time to set an example. The new armor for his elite twelve thousand came with a few machines to allow them to get there faster.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>-----</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“CAPTAIN!” The comms rang from Hotel. “There’s a special Tyrsian unit, much faster, Hotel Three is gone…” A blast tore out, and a different voice came across. “Hotel Two, we’re being wiped out, withdrawing…” Boom. Shen cursed, what the hell was going on. “Delta, fire everything you have at the former location of Hotel Team. I want whatever killed them erased. Foxtrot, Golf… “Delta-2, some strange Tyrsian super-unit just ripped the hatches off the other two and threw grenades in, we’re trying to suppress –“ the voice was cut off with a scream as foxtrot and golf fired madly to the main body of the enemy, mauling the infantry badly but a gravely voice, speaking an ugly hash of Tyrsian and Ivari, spoke through the comms. “I am chieftain General Tiochnx. The commander of all the Dominion’s ground forces. And my elite are coming for you.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Foxtrot and golf did a little better, apparently inflicting more casualties on the enemy elite unit but Shen felt like screaming. There were still well over fifteen million Tyrsians arrayed against some twelve million humans and his tanks were going to be destroyed. He heard foxtrot and golf go silent, imitating that Tyrsians had merely dropped on their hatches from above, only to hear Bravo’s report of flying Tyrsians before they too went silent. Alpha and Charlie were next, and after firing off the killswitches on each to keep the enemy from capturing them and taking what he hoped was the enemy’s chieftain general with them, Shen continued commanding his lone remaining Rhino firing into the enemy ranks until finally the hatch was ripped open by a Tyrsian sword, at which point Shen murmured a quick prayer to his ancestors to receive him well and hauled down the killswitch.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>----</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Col. Jaegar was with the infantry, the blood of the Tyrsians and humans alike splattered all over the ground, slowly pushing back against the hated lizard apes. The Rhino tanks had been destroyed with some communication of an elite enemy force coming after them. The suicide blasts on the tanks had done their work well in ripping holes in the enemy, holes the generals of both Corps were trying desperately to exploit. From Second corps came a scream over the comms that their entire Charlie division had been wiped out by a super unit and supporting forces. Jaegar cursed. “Alright, wolf regiment, I’ve had just about enough of the Tyrsian elite fucking this plan up and if we don’t do something we’re going to be defeated in detail. We’re going to support Second’s Delta division.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The speed of wolf regiment was likely part of their legend. Pulling out of their own trench and racing to the embattled Second corps with advice to the Fourth to hold with everything they had, taking shots while moving, almost all headshots, would become the core of a many heroic war films in post-war human cinema. In the moment, all Jaegar cared about was stopping the annihilation of the ground forces and the collapse of the front until replacements…some billion of them…finished training.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>------</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tiochnx was in his element, furious as he was at the losses of three thousand elite to those damn self-destructing tanks, as well as several million lesser soldiers, they’d done their work, the humans were now running out of tricks. The ill-favored crimson gore of his foes anointed his armor and he felt alive the way only a Tyrsian warrior could. “KILL THE HUMANS AND BRING THEIR DEFIANCE TO A CLOSE.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jaegar’s regiment began blasting through the Tyrsian forces and blaring recordings of wolf howls from their armor to frighten the enemy. Jaegar himself took it a step further, extending the retractable wrist bayonets on his armor and bringing forth the holographic camouflage system to make it appear as though his suit was turning into a wolf that walked on two legs. A few Tyrsians flinched from the strange monster facing them and Jaegar gunned them down without slowing. His forces began slowly, slowly forcing the enemy back. Then the worst happened. His weapon clicked empty and he found himself out of reloads. He drew his pistol and found to his horror that more and more of his forces were doing the same. “Fuck this, I am not going to die cowering in a fucking trench.” He leapt out as he fired the last of his rounds, drawing his own vibroswords and pointing at a Tyrsian with strange crimson and black trim to its armor. “You. Me. To the finish.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He realized that the Tyrsians might not have a tradition of single combat when the others pulled back and he signaled his forces to do the same, as well as scrounge reloads. “Chieftain general?” The other being nodded and drew its own swords. Jaegar laughed. Even now, in space-age warfare, two races of warriors still held to the idea of single combat between heroes. The galaxy was a strange place.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0022"><h2>22. Dominion Knights</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Lion Fleet and Tiger Squadron, together with Third Armada came to the challenge of the Vulpexi crown fleet. Shiloh Hendrix gave her orders to her forces, ensuring that they knew every detail of the battle plan. Lt. Callie was a bit more succinct with Tiger Squadron. “All right, boys and girls, the other units have to pin down the Vulpexi crown fleet. Our task is to eliminate the knights of the dominion and destroy the flagship of the Vulpexi grand admiral. Once this is complete, the war will be over.” As they entered the cockpits and were expelled from the carrier, Jake barked out, “This is the last battle of the war, team. Act like it and we’ll be able to go home.” He took a breath and as they keyed weapons he spat the traditional battle cry, “Tiger squadron, FANGS OUT!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The fighters clashed between stars, dancing in a lethal single combat against each other in contests where pure skill and luck determined who lived or died, humans coming out the victor more often than not. The heavier ships blasted at each other across vast distances, Lion Fleet crashing through the enemy formation and doing incalculable damage to the Vulpexi crown fleet, guns blazing away and sending thousands of the slugs screaming into the silent void of space. Tiger squadron flashed around the fringes of the battle, shattering every and any attempt by enemy fighters to begin swarming larger ships. Eventually Third Armada ran into trouble and began being picked apart, after dealing incredible damage to the Vulpexi forces.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Matras watched as the human fleet appeared to engage him. He ordered a firing course to tear down their best, and began enveloping third armada with the full might of the Crown Fleet. The human forces were good and did a lot of damage but ultimately they would be ground down. He heard the first reports of Tiger Squadron, that hated, hated fighter unit and when he did he smiled, evilly. “Excellent. Dominion knights, your task is to find and utterly destroy Tiger Squadron and the rest of you are to focus your efforts on destroying Lion Fleet. The Humans rely too much on their myths of heroes, show them how hollow that is and break their spirits.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake watched as a different unit of Vulpexi fighters showed up. They easily dismantled a lesser fighter squadron, and Jake had spotted the ship they’d deployed from. “Shit, enemy aces.” Callie wheeled to engage them, corkscrewing rapidly to evade fire from her opponents as Tony and Alicia shot her current pursuers off her back. “Tiger Squadron, follow me, eliminate the enemy ace unit.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Shiloh Hendrix watched the battle unfold from the bridge of the Lionheart and ordered her corvettes and destroyers forward to engage the enemy battleships on the wings, with orders that her own battleships be used to attack Vulpexi dreadnaughts at a three to one ratio while her own guns tore their corvettes and destroyers apart. Third armada was hopelessly embattled but they were making a fight of it. “Come on, this is the last battle of the war, let’s finish this shit.” She ordered her flagship forward mowing down two massive battleships and a half dozen enemy destroyers as the fleet pushed up to assist the struggling Third Armada.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>-----</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Callie attacked the Dominion knights alongside Alicia and Tony, along with the rest of Tiger Squadron. The attack was going well but at every turn she found her fellow pilots…sometimes herself, outmaneuvered. They were in trouble against the enemy aces. As she swept around she blew another one to pieces and saw one of her comrades get flashed with the gamma pulse guns and heard the scream, indicating fatal irradiation.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Damn it, Roberts!” Tony swore. “Fuckers!” The other young man wheeled and began attacking somewhat more recklessly. “Tony, be careful. You need to slow down.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tony swept wide and twisted under, then blew apart two more Dominion knights. “You want to dance with the devil LT, let’s lead the bastard..” A flash of light and Tony screamed. “Damn. Point taken, miss. I’ll…” Another flash, another dominion knight gone, and Tony’s voice came through weaker. “Damn me… Come on you scum sucking---” Another flash and Tony screamed. “All of you…good luck…” He punched his ship into warp and rammed a battleship at near-warp speed before the point defense cut him apart. “FUCK! TONY! Alright, everyone, be careful, let’s take them down…” Alicia screamed over the comms as well.</span>
  <span> “Fuck. Jake, your orders. Get to the enemy flagship, I’ll keep the aces off your back. Eliminate the Grand Admiral, that is your sole priority.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake sounded like he wanted to argue, but as Callie blasted away two more Dominion knights, he knew he couldn’t. “You got it, LT.” He wheeled his ship, leaving his lover and best friend to answer the dominion knights, and prepared to give his best attempt at ending the war.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0023"><h2>23. Tipping Point</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Last Battle of the War</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Colonel Hann Jaeger of Wolf Regiment, faced down Chieftain-General Tiochnx of the Vulpexi Dominion’s ground forces, a Tyrsian. Both warriors held a vibrosword in each hand. Both had ordered their forces back, where each side went back to their trenches, Wolf Regiment to scavenge ammunition from their fallen comrades. As each leader faced the other, their soldiers watched one another, each ready and eager to finish the battle, to resume the killing and go home. War had long since become ingrained in the seasoned troops, killing in battle a reflex, war its own excuse.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jaeger swiped his swords at Tiochnx and swore when they were blocked before vaulting back, using the power of his armor to evade. Tiochnx’s scything swords hissed above and below him, Jaegar vaulting and backflipping between the two before slicing desperately at his massive opponent. Goddamnit. I should have practiced melee work a bit more… </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The thought was cut short by a furious assault during which Jaegar could have sworn Tiochnx had six arms each holding a sword, not two. He parried and flipped and dodged and rolled, coming up swinging at his massive opponent’s ankles, only for the massive Tyrsian general to evade his strokes. Jaeger felt he was doing fairly well as he began pressing the attack and driving his opponent back. Left, right, left left, parry, sidestep, right, lunge, leap, cleave, pause as Tiochnx began sweeping him back and he began retreating again. The Tyrsian already seemed to be a little slower though. Jaeger smiled under the helmet. The larger warrior was assaulting him furiously but Jaeger was ready. He continued to parry and retreat, dancing with death against a monster from beyond the stars.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jaeger started laughing like a madman. “Come on you crocodilian fuck. COME ON!” He began swinging back and pushing the Tyrsian back. The larger fighter was visibly surprised that something so much smaller than itself was fighting back so well but in truth, Tiochnx didn’t think it would matter. He was a Tyrsian, a bloodline of warriors and trained from the time it could walk to fight. The human was simply a hairless ape that amounted to little more than a talented novice in comparison. He pushed forward to finish the fight with one last brutal assault…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And found its blades passing harmlessly by the human, who stepped aside effortlessly and brought its own swords up.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jaeger smiled viciously as one of his swords plunged through Tiochnx’s chest and he twisted the blade, slicing it out through the side. He plunged the other through the monster’s foot as the entrails spilled out, then, swept both blades around and took the head off Tiochnx’s shoulders before snap-kicking the head back towards enemy lines. “WHO’S NEXT!?” He dived back into the trench and began firing his gauss rifle at the enemy, letting out a loud whoop as the Ursa Shock Battalion landed and began slamming forward into the enemy forces. “Hell yes. Vasiliev, drinks are on me tonight, let’s finish this!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Russian signaled the affirmative and began deploying the heavy weapons against the demoralized Tyrsian elite troops.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Callie was furious inside, internally screaming that these fucking SLUGS had murdered Tony and Alicia. They were going to pay. Sweeping around as the enemy ace unit kept firing at her and cutting off every exit.  She’d been winged, once, her shields handling the shot in a way she knew they couldn’t a second time and there were still seven aces left. Up, barrel roll, loop with corkscrew, a gamma pulse missing her by inches as the rest of Tiger Squadron – all six that were left – engaged against the dozens of enemy normal fighters swarming to assist in the kill. Her guns took one ace apart, she swept wide, firing one of her lancers to kick off a chain reaction against the swarming normals and immediately saw a chance…she fired the other, then plunged straight down while that chain reaction destroyed three more aces. Only three left, though she’d been hoping to get it down to two on one. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She sped away from the bulk of the battle, pursued by only the three of them, and entered the system’s asteroid belt, using the massive rocks as cover, as terrain to maneuver with. Using gravity like the most primitive humans had used a sling, she whirled around an asteroid to gain extra speed to intercept one. Two left.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A flash of gamma radiation buzzed her shields, which had at this point recharged and she led them through a denser patch. Contrary to 20th and 21st century films, asteroid belts weren’t super hazardous unless you were in a truly massive ship attempting to warp through them, but they made for an interesting time with navigation. She dove into a crater on one of them as the enemy followed her, swept out the other side and came soaring up from beneath as her opponent exited, blasting the belly of his fighter and turning it into burning slag.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Just one left.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Unfortunately, that last seemed to be the best of the bunch. Weapons blazing, it engaged her. Dancing around it, a single combat between equals in an asteroid belt in the void between stars…there was something beautiful about it. Something horrifying but for a moment she didn’t care. What an incredible high. She flickered as it pursued her, suddenly facing the enemy ace, which managed to evade her shots before coming around and attempting to blindside erase her. Callie, however, hadn’t become the CO of the ace unit of the human race by collecting bottlecaps, and easily anticipated the maneuver, barrel rolling to put an asteroid between her opponent and herself. The enemy wheeled around it and evaded her burst, only to fire again and be evaded in turn. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re beginning to piss me off.” The adrenaline high still hadn’t worn off but she was beginning to worry about the rest of the squadron, though according to signal there were still four left of them, including Jake, and First and Fourth Armada’s had arrived, albeit each only at half strength after their own battles. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She whipped around as she noticed that the enemy craft had started maneuvering again and she was only barely able to avoid death this time, sweeping under an asteroid to get away, coming back up, cockpit facing down towards the surface and parallel to it, firing and finally, she winged her opponent, who attempted to escape, only for her to pull down and pursue. The chase lasted a little while, still flickering around asteroids and comets, hiding in craters, but finally, her opponent was in her crosshairs and she squeezed the triggers, flying back to her squadron, assisting in driving off the enemy normal fighters as the heavier ships drew close. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake was having the ride of his life. Dodging the massive point defenses, never ceasing to move, blasting them with his coil guns whenever there was a gap, this was what he was made for, this incredibly fucked up carnival of death between the stars. And apparently, with the war coming to a close, the last ride of the day was almost here. He continued to evade, taking out the point defenses a little at a time, knowing that eventually, his luck might run out but with all the other fighters preoccupied, he’d end the Vulpexi Grand Admiral first.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Matras watched the majority of that hated human ace unit, Tiger Squadron, being destroyed and had exalted, and upon watching Lion Fleet fall back he felt as though his triumph was assured. The Dominion Knights had been picked off a bit at a time, and with the re-arrival of the best ace in Tiger Squadron he supposed they’d been annihilated, which was unfortunate since in the time it had taken her to return, the taste of victory had gone sour as two more human armadas warped into the system and tore apart his reserves. And now there was another member of Tiger Squadron, the one who’d destroyed a few other capitol ships, dancing with his guns and likely to outmatch them. “All fighters to me!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Callie and what was left of Tiger squadron took shameless advantage of the enemy fighters distraction to begin wiping them out in earnest.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake continued his deadly dance, finally spotting the deflector nexii and ripping apart the point defenses around them methodically, corkscrewing and barrel-rolling back and forth to avoid the enemy guns. When he finally was clear, he fired a single lancer at each focal point of the nexus, the first, he swept from bow to stern of the enemy ship at a 45 degree angle to avoid the counter, firing as he did, eliminating one point on the nexus. Then he swept forward again and blew out the other side, strafing the point defenses as he did so. He flipped over and raced back towards the enemy bridge, preparing to fire his single,30-kiloton antimatter warhead.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Matras looked at the battlefield and realized, to his humiliation, that he’d lost and would shortly die. For all that. He stared down the human flying towards his bridge and simply sighed as the warhead flew out.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>**</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake pulled up as the warhead impacted and blew apart the enemy bridge, then soared away. “YES! Callie, the Grand Admiral is dead! We did it, the war is damn near over!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The voice on the other end sounded elated but tired. “Jake…we lost just about the entire squadron. Let’s finish up the battle and try to get them home.” He assented, and they dove back in, his cry of “Fangs out!” A little quieter than usual.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0024"><h2>24. War's End</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>The mop up and the peace treaties. Good news, the Vulpexi did in fact surrender.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Shiloh Hendrix and Lion Fleet waited above the Killick Homeworld, now armed with hundreds of Nova Bombs. With adequate force, they’d crack the planet open and light the atmosphere on fire, ending the Killick participation in the war. It had been discovered early on by snipers that neutralizing a Killick Queen ended her hive, and now that the Ivari had discovered the Queen Mother, the one that laid the eggs for all the other queens, could be targeted, it meant that the Killick species would shortly be going extinct.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Orders had come down from the President and High Commander themselves. The Killick Queen mother was apparently beyond massive…upon scanning the surface of the enemy home world, Shiloh gasped. “Holy shit.” She may have been an Aussie but THAT was a bigger bug than she’d ever seen. That…it was the size of fucking Mexico. Completely immobile, but…a scream ripped into her head. She knew it wasn’t hers, thought for one hysterical moment that it was the queen’s before remembering that space couldn’t carry sound. And the screaming…it was inside her head. Then a voice. “Food for the children. They must feed. You come as food to us, the Vulpexi let us free, to devour worlds as we once did.”</span>
  <span> It was the queen, something speaking in her head.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Commander Shiloh shuddered. That…was not okay. “All units, prepare nova bombs on the giant fucking bug. Once that’s done…” The screams ripped into her head, and she watched as Kilicks massacred and devoured entire worlds in her mind, realizing that this was the past. The Kilicks had been restrained from that by the Vulpexi…irrelevant. They were going to be rid of both shortly. “Nova Bombs prepared, Commander.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Excellent. Fire.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The screams that rent her head this time were ones of panic. Ones that were suddenly silenced. Around the galaxy, queens fell silent. The myriad drones fell as well, waiting quietly to starve to death, lobotomized by the death of their queen.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>----</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lion fleet and the Commander’s heavy fleet and the Nova bombs were being sent forward to the Vulpexi home world to finish the war. Star by star, the Vulpexi were driven back, their planets bombed, taken, their slaves freed, their populace eradicated. Soon enough the Vulpexi home world was all that remained. For months, Tiger Squadron had engaged in conventional bombing. Wolf Regiment and the Ursa shock forces dropped and caused all sorts of chaos and terror. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Slaves were freed each time, loaded onto Ivari stealth ships and brought safely to orbit, Vulpexi and Tyrsians gunned down during fights. Still the Tribunal of Vulpexi refused to surrender.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So Adisa was sent down, along with Viper Team, to assassinate the current ones and hope the next set would prove more reasonable.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>As she and her forces stepped into the drop pods, she took a deep breath. One more, then the war would finally be over.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The siren sounded and Viper Team dropped onto the Vulpexi homeworld for the second time. Almost immediately upon landing they were sprinting. Adisa was a machine, but an exhilarated one. Two or three shots from her gravity SMG and every shot was a headshot. The Tyrsian praetorian guard of the tribunal stood no chance. Upon entering the tribunal chamber, spotting hundreds of Vulpexi officials, Adisa and her team proceeded to slaughter them all with short, sharp bursts, before eliminating the trio on the podium that were clearly the tribunal. She sprinted back out, a few Tyrsian brutes attempting to block her way before sliding, nearly decapitated, into puddles of their own blood after she slithered across their backs and slit their throats.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Viper team had a few targets. A number of officers who High Command didn’t think should get to survive a war with humanity. They entered the office of a few lesser commanders and efficiently slaughtered them. Adisa felt nothing, now. Just a cold determination to see the end of the war. To look into her eyes was to understand her callsign, “Mamba.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When the assassinations were done, Adisa and her crew leapt aboard an Ivari stealth ship, and the Alliance’s leadership hailed the Vulpexi government again. “You are commanded, Vulpexi. You are to offer your unconditional surrender, or you are to be exterminated via nova bombing. You have three galactic standard days to comply.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The answer came in six minutes. “We offer our full and unconditional surrender. Damn you, humans, but you’ve won.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Epomi wept with joy that the terror of war was over. The Dembra nodded and began beating the metal forged for weapons into tools. The Ivari breathed sighs of relief. The Nathians exalted, and prepared to do the hard work of helping those who’d been slaves for generations to rebuild themselves. The humans simply sagged with exhaustion. After such a long war…after going, in one generation, from being uncertain of other spacefaring races to being the premiere military power of the galaxy…it was a culture shock, more than that, it was shattering and horrifying. While their wrath would have carried them forward unto the Vulpexi’s annihilation had the enemy not surrendered, they were relieved that such had been unnecessary.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jake and Callie were decorated with full honors and given their sabers, albeit without the warheads, and told that if they so wished, they could continue patrolling the galaxy along with their remaining squadron mates. However, those other young pilots had had enough of war, and soon resigned, leaving the young Nathians-by-adoption to roam the galaxy alone but for each other. While the scars of the war would never heal, this was as good as they could have hoped.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Shiloh Hendrix and Col. Jaegar continued to serve with distinction, eventually earning the titles of “Grand Admiral of the Alliance” and “Supreme General.” Major Vasiliev retired, having finished the last war he ever wanted to be involved in. And Adisa remained part of the Viper teams.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Namna herself continued working in the Aid Corps, after a brief period of leave granted to allow her to spend time with her adoptive brother and sister. She attempted to convince them to seek medical aid for psychological trauma, however they avoided it to avoid publicity.</span>
</p><p><span>After that, the Federation rebuilt, rehabilitating the Vulpexi’s former slaves, and with human ability to form alliances and with the help of the Nathians, the Tyrsians soon joined in the Federation, lending their strength to the nation.</span><br/><br/>So closes the story of the Dominion War.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>That’s the end of the story of the Dominion war. For that matter, it’s the end of the story of the Dominion. But the story of humanity in the galaxy, and the story of Tiger Squadron and the Aid Corps? Those are just getting started.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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